Willing-unwilling divide to blur at Singur today

Singur: On a November afternoon a decade ago, Singur was first caught in a debate between "willing" and "unwilling" landowners, a narrative that would go on to alter the Bengal political scene.
Years later on Thursday, when chief minister Mamata Banerjee steps into the now-abandoned Tata Motors project site to hand over "physical possession" of land to 25 farmers, she will bridge the gap between the two sides; the list of 25 comprises both "willing" and "unwilling" land owners.
On November 11, 2006, a couple of weeks after then CM Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and Tata Group chairperson Ratan Tata announced the setting up of the Nano car plant in Singur, Tata Motors officials reached Singur. It was a divided village they faced. In Gopalnagar Ghoshpara, residents Nilmadhab Ghosh, Malati Ghosh and Asoke Dhara made it clear they were not ready to give up their land for the project. Malati even chased the Tata officials away from her plot. But another villager, Joydeb Ghosh, was ready to offer his 12-bigha of land for the project, besides requesting that a Nano showroom be set up in Singur. The state acquired his land and set up an "engine room" at the factory that was never used.
On Wednesday afternoon, the quartet was among the few hundred curious onlookers who flocked to the Singur block land and land reforms office. A couple of hours later, they stepped out. "It is a proud day for us. We will get our land back. We have already been given the records of rights and the compensation due. Now, we get the physical possession of our land," Ghosh said. A little later, the district administration asked him to step into the factory site and stand on his land, a drill they will repeat on Thursday before Mamata.
Joydeb is relieved for a different reason: "When I gave my land away, a fertile one at that, I thought it was for the greater cause the factory would lead to. It didn't happen. I am happy to get my land back," he said.
State minister and the party's Hooghly observer Partha Chatterjee supervised the last-minute preparations before the Thursday event when Mamata is supposed to deliver a speech from a makeshift podium at Gopalnagar. He said they hoped to finish the land hand-over process before the SC's 12-week deadline of November.