KOLKATA: India’s Tata Motors can go ahead with making the world’s cheapest car in the east of the country after talks yielded a compromise ending violent protests against its factory, officials said yesterday. West Bengal state’s opposition Trinamool Congress party, which has been spearheading opposition to the plant, said it had reached a deal with the state government that would see some of the land returned to displaced farmers.
Other farmers in the Singur area near Kolkata, the site of the factory set to mass produce the low-budget “Nano” car, would be given compensation — addressing their complaints that they were forcibly evicted — officials said.
“Tata Motors can now go ahead with its work at the plant,” senior Trinamool Congress official Kalyan Banerjee told reporters at a news conference marking the successful end of three days of tough talks. “It’s a big victory of farmers in Singur,” said opposition leader Mamata Banerjee. Mamata met for nearly two hours at Raj Bhavan, Gov. Gopalkrishna Gandhi’s official residence, to cobble together “an acceptable formula” on the Singur imbroglio. “An acceptable formula has been found, but some more discussions are still needed,” Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) central committee Shyamal Chahraborty told reporters after the meeting.
This is the first time the two leaders met following a bitter controversy over acquisition of agricultural land for the Rs.15-billion or $25-million small car Nano project in Singur. The meeting was preceded by intense negotiations by the governor, who met the chief minister in the morning for an hour, before Mamata arrived at 2.35 p.m., and Bhattacharjee once again at 4.45 p.m.
The issue made international headlines in the past few days, and the Sri Lanka government yesterday invited Tata Motors to relocate the car project to that country.
In New Delhi, CPI-M General Secretary Prakash Karat broke his silence on the controversy, saying his party wanted the Tata Motors to stay in West Bengal.
And in Kolkata, the state committee of the ruling Left Front met twice — in the morning and in the evening — and advised Bhattacharjee’s government to be more flexible and find more land, if needed, to resolve the issue.
