Interview with Mamata Banerjee

I must confess that I am very poor with the lay of Kolkata even after spending more than 4 years here and therefore used the services of a driver to land me to Mamata’s current abode – set right in the middle of a labyrinth of narrow lanes. I was surprised that Mamata had so readily agreed to be interviewed – not after my, shall we say, encouraging last post on the Singur impasse.

So there I was, standing at the formidable lady’s doorway; me in my tee and jeans, with a borrowed digital camera slung awkwardly across my shoulder and a thick black BILT notebook in my hand. Did I look the jurno type I wonder! But I sure was all strung up. This was after all my first celebrity interview!

As I stood at the doorway debating how to address the lady, the door opens up to reveal her Ladyship herself and I blurted out in Bengali, “Mashi, ami Supratim, interview-ta netae eschi” which to effect meant “Auntie, this is Supratim and I have come for the interview…” Her Ladyship visibly stiffened and with a sharp scowl responded “I am no one’s Mashi, call me Didi….everyone calls me Didi here so…anyway come on in”.

Here’s a verbatim transcript of the interview that ensured:

SK: It’s an honour to be having been invited to carry this interview and thank you for sparing time from your hectic-hectic schedule.

MB: Let’s dispense with the niceties…make it quick…there is a delegation of some social activists who I am expecting in 20 minutes…will you care for some tea?

SK: No, Thank you. Can we start…and would you mind if I record the interview?

MB: I am waiting…and please keep the recorder between the two of us and don’t fiddle with it.

SK: Didi, I have heard that there are three P’s that your life revolves around – Poetry, Politics and Painting – how do you order the three P’s and why only P’s?

MB: The three P’s are like three children to me…I love each of them equally and like all children they vie for my attention always, but the eldest one ‘Politics’ is by far the naughtiest and the unruly one…and while these are the main P’s there are some smaller P’s (she smiles) – P’s that no one knows about.

SK: Didi, can you shed light on the other P’s?


MB: Well, I have never spoken publicly on those….but…okay…one of them is plotting (she gives a mischievous grin and her eyes twinkle). You know Supratim I am a dramatist at heart…I love drama…but there is only a small wrinkle here…while I know how to start a drama, I have still not mastered the art of developing a closure…I guess it will come in time…

SK: (A little wide-eyed) Didi, if you don’t mind, could you please elaborate on this?

MB: Look, I started the extended Metro project while I was the Railways Minister in Delhi but even after a decade it’s yet to see the light of day….more recently the Nandigram impasse…I started it out well and there was a lot of drama…the plot was nicely sewed up but then the ending…Singur…again, I thought I had thought out the ending…but the ending is veering away from my ending. It’s maddening I say….each of my dramas behaving so atrociously!

SK: (I don’t have the heart to ask about her other P’s and lunge for the next question) Didi, I understand your feelings about Singur but why did you block the national highway?

MB: (Didi gets visibly agitated here) You guys are no different…you are speaking just like those media guys…and I thought…No I did not block the highway…the highway came between us and the oppressors (TATA’s). If the government and the honourable courts were so concerned about the highway why, tell me why, didn’t they move the highway a little sideways…Ba re!

SK: Didi, I noticed that Medha Patekar is your ardent supporter. How did you meet her?

MB: Truth be told, I didn’t know about her till the Narmada Dam issue came up and drove her hopping mad (dam read backwards!!!). But once I met her I felt that we had a lot in common! We don’t invest in combs, always wear white sarees – a little dirty and crumpled sometimes – and can be heard for miles around, with or without a microphone. Not to forget she is a social activist and I activate societies.

SK: Didi, the Nano project by the TATA’s is supposed to help industrialisation in the state, why are you opposing it?

MB: I am not opposing the project…this is all wrong…it is those communist agents who are spreading this type of disinformation…let me put the record straight…I am all for industrialisation but why do these TATA need so much land…small car, small land…better still no land…we all know agriculture needs land, but whoever said industrialisation needs land…you seem to be a sensible person, you should know…


SK: But…

MB: I am not finished…and please don’t interrupt…I lose my train of thoughts and focus…As I was saying, why can’t the farmer farm the farm while Tata Babu makes his car…that way he can shout to the farmer who can help him paint the car or fit the bumper or help in a thousand other things and the farmer can always sell the freshest produce…Tata babu can always have the freshest breakfast, lunch and dinner…grow healthy and produce more small cars…and there we are, everyone happy.

SK: But Didi, the Tata’s would need to create factories to mass produce the cars and this will help generate jobs for the people and a myriad other things.

MB: Maybe you are not as bright as you look… Dhritarastra (the mythical Indian king in the Mahabharata) had, if I recollect correctly, over 100 children and in one lifetime…he is the father of mass production in India and did he need a factory…and here we have Tata babu who is a spinster but thinks about mass production…and didn’t I just tell you that Tata Babu could shout to the farmer for help…I am lowering Tata babu’s cost and there he is threatening to withdraw the project.

It is at this point that Derek O’Brian, the noted columnist and humble Trinamool (Mamata’s political outfit) worker steps in.

DOB: I couldn’t help overhearing and had to step in. Didi is absolutely right. When will you guys understand Didi. She has the good of everyone at heart…the good of Bengal…its people, farmers, workers and the industrialists of India.

MB: Derek, it is no use explaining anything to these guys…and Supratim is no different. It was my mistake that I thought that he was different. Why, I can hear the social activists shouting…they must have turned into our alley…I got to go!

And thus,I unceremoniously ended my first celebrity interview, and in the rush of things all but forgot about taking an interview snap and have had to rely on one of those google(ed) images.

Maybe Buddhadev Bhattacharya will accede to my interview request next.

When Politicians lose their marbles...

What does a nation or a state do when confronted with politicians who have figuratively and literally lost their marbles? Take the case of Mamata Banerjee, the indomitable and maverick politician, who ironically swears by the three P’s – Painting, Politics and Poetry – don’t ask me in what order. She has single-handedly managed to hold an entire state to ransom by going hammer and tongs at the TATA’s ‘Nano’ car project at Singur; and going by the latest reports the TATA’s are peeved at the way the dispute has been handled and are in a good mood to pull out of the state and relocate their signal small car project.

It’s a strange breed of mammals these politicians – thinking the shortest of the short term – if and when they are thinking, if at all! If this wasn’t enough we have so called ‘intellectuals’ and ‘social activists’ a.k.a. Medha Patkar and her likes – who love nothing but diving right into the already murky waters as soon a ripe and juicy opportunity presents itself – Singur being a case in point. The Singur impasse has all the portents of pushing the state back into the industrial dark ages with the Wipro’s and Infosys’s of life emitting ominous growls.

While there will always be a heated debate on whether agriculture should take precedence over industry or vice-versa, in so much as land is concerned – the ability to arrive at an amicable solution, where the interests of each of the stakeholders are addressed to the maximum extent possible, is what is sorely missing from our political masters. While listening to the Guv (Gopal Krishna Gandhi), who mediated between the opposition and the government, I felt the TATA’s would necessarily have been taken into confidence by the back-room boys and posted minute by minute on the unfolding discussions. It is stupefying to even think that a government would go-ahead and negotiate deals with its distracters without taking one of the principal stakeholders into confidence. What use is of having an intellectual in Buddhadev Bhattacharya as the Chief Minister?

On one hand we have the intransigence of Mamata Banerjee, who like Nero was painting Khaas Phool (a kinda flower?), confident in the belief that she is doing good for the state and its populace, while infact she had single-handedly managed to push ‘industrialisation’ on an express elevator to hell. On the other side of the coin are the honourable Chief Minister and his colleagues working like a pair of Tweeddalde and Tweeddaldums unaware of the basics of negotiating deals – forever content with igniting and fighting fire.