New Delhi - Thousands of protestors in India's eastern state
of West Bengal Sunday laid a siege around a factory manufacturing the
world's cheapest car, the Nano, to demand return of farmland acquired
for the project.
Led by the state's opposition leader, Mamata Bannerjee, activist
Medha Patkar and politicians, an estimated 50,000 farmers, villagers
and party activists converged on the factory site in Singur, near the
main city of Kolkata.
Organizers said this was the biggest demonstration in India
against 'land seizure' for setting up an industry. They expected the
number of protestors to swell to 200,000, claiming many were still
reaching the site.
The factory, operated by Tata, among India's biggest industrial
houses, resembled a fortress with the communist-ruled state
government deploying nearly 3,000 policemen to break up any violent
protests.
Groups of farmers in Singur said some farmland for the plant was
forcibly acquired by the state government and given to the company.
They are demanding that Tata return 160 of the 403 hectares allotted
for the factory to the farmers.
But Tata argue that the land is required to set up units for spare
parts and component vendors and shifting them would make it difficult
to keep the costs of the car low.
Bannerjee planned the 'indefinite strike' at Singur in the
backdrop of a threat by Tata owner, Ratan Tata, to withdraw the
project from the state if agitation continued.
'I would like to request all of you to abstain from any violence.
This agitation is for the cause of common people,' Bannerjee said.
The Trinamool Congress and its allies have set up 21 camps
alongside the boundary wall of the site.
'No industry can be founded on the dead bodies of the farmers,'
said Amar Singh, leader of the Samajwadi (Socialist) Party, who has
joined the demonstration.
Tata, India's leading vehicle maker, has invested over 375 million
dollars in the plant at Singur. The first Nano cars, priced at
nearly 2,400 dollars a unit, were scheduled to roll out in October.
A prototype of the Nano, dubbed the 'People's Car,' was unveiled
with much fanfare at the car exhibition in Delhi in January. It is a
623-cc car with a 33-horsepower multipoint fuel injection petrol
engine.
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