Dear friends,

The West Bengal government has began an undeclared war
against the toiling masses of Singur from 2 December,
2006. The police has indiscriminately charged lathi
and teargas and beaten entering the house of the local
people. The police also set fire on the paddy mounds
of the locality. The local people have been resisting
in their own way. The police has arrested more than
fifty persons from the area. Some of the protesters
are seriously injured and have been admitted to
hospital.

The govt. has already imposed section 144 from 30^th
November in the extended area of Singur and arrested
whoever boarded down from the train or moving towards
Singur. The government has prohibited all assemblies
in the Singur area.

While trying to visit the disturbed area several times
Medha Patkar has been intercepted by the police and
sent back to Kolkata.

The government who has been propagating that the
peasanty of Singur voluntarily gave more than 90 %
land, has been erecting fence around the disputed land
with the presence of more than 10 thousand armed
police. It is nothing but a fraud of democracy.

Several organizations and eminent personalities of
West Bengal has unequivocally condemned police
atrocities at Singur. In different parts of West
Bengal road blockade, There have been several rail
roko, dharna, protest rally etc to express solidarity
towards the protesting people of Singur..

Please intervene positively

Gautam Sen

on behalf of

Joint Forum against Eviction

---

 II. National Hawker Federation

16/17 College Street, Kolkata-700012,

Ph/Fax: 91-33-22196688

E-mail: nationalhawkerfederation gmail.com /
saktimghosh yahoo.com

***

Respected Sir/ Madam,

Smt. Medha Pathker along
with Smt. Anuradha Talwar and Smt. Rakha was
forcefully hijacked when she was entering singur
(Monday, 04/12/2006, 11:00 AM ) to visit traumatized
and injured farmers, who are resisting the barbaric
police forces to taking over their lands forcefully. A
huge police force was present at Purushuttampur 5 km
away from Sinngur. They suddenly and forcefully
stopped Medha Patker and other 5 Activists who were
also going to Singur with her. Then she was told that
no out-siders can enter at Singur and they can not
allow them because of Law & order problems. Then She
has along with other three women activists have been
hijacked from Purushottompur near Singur and their
after has been detained to the coal India Guest House
at Dankuni with a huge police guard, total 15 to 18
police Jeeps along with 4 matadors full of Combat
Commandos and more then 150 armed Police personnel and
some high rank police officials. She was badly
harassed by Police. No body even if reporter also was
able to visit with her till evening but at the evening
she had a talk with the Press , she said to the press
that she want to visit Singur but the police was not
allowing her and they are ill-behaved with her. Until
the police allow her to go to Singru, she would stay
at Dancuni Coal India Guest House and she would not
return to Kolkata. She was denied to take any food
from the authorities and for the whole day they all
were fasted.

It is the utter-shame for a democratic left ruling
State to continue this type of barbaric atrocities on
their citizens and activists. This type of brutal and
barbaric acts of the West Bengal State Government
should be condemned by every individuals and
organizations who believe in democracy and justice and
when a state is willing to change their character from
welfare state to a Fasist State then the
responsibility of conversion the Ahimsa or
non-violence people movement to a violent extremist
movement is laying on the State. Please send an appeal
to immediately allow Medha Patkar and others to enter
Singur, immediately stop the land acquisition work and
remove the police force from Singur by e-mail & fax to
the Governor of West Bengal, Chief Minister of West
Bengal, Prime minister of India and President of India
on the name of your respective Organisations.

With Regards

Sudipta Moitra

National Hawker Federation

---

 III. MASUM’s Fact Finding Report dated 2.12.2006

Now, Singur, an obscure place in District: Hooghly,
West Bengal hijacked the National
limelight for the resistance shown by the agrarian
populace of the place against forceful
land gabbing of the State administration. The local
people had been building up the
resistance since long in the area where a TATA group
decided to establish a motor vehicle
factory in the acquired land in Singur. The local
resisting force got some intellectuals and
student activists by their side for this cause. They
were camping in Beraberi, Ghaser Veri
and nearby villages for resisting forcible acquiring
of their own land, many areas of which
are fertile and multi crop producing lands. The noted
social activist, Ms. Medha Patkar
was also present to show her solidarity with the
movement and a public tribunal was
organized few days back and she took active
participation in it.

The state government deployed a large number of police
contingent and Rapid Action
Force (RAF), near about 5000, over there, and is
continuing the force deployment in the
area. The government already promulgated the
prohibitory order u/s 144 of Criminal
Procedure Code (Cr.P.C.) in Singur. When the
government officials started barbing the
land on 2^nd November 2006 at about 10 a. m., the local
villagers tried to resist the attempt
of the government by mobilizing the masses. In due
course of time, violence broke out and
police force and RAF resorted to widespread
lathi-charge and firing tear-gas shells and
rubber bullets. It has been reported that the police
entered in to the adjoining villages and
mercilessly beat and physically assaulted the
villagers indiscriminately showing no respect
to the women, old people and children. Number of
people got severe injuries due to police
brutality. The police entered in to the houses and
ventured into the roof top and beat up
unarmed peaceful people with batons causing
bloodsheds.

Singur is in highlight already due to “Leftist”
government’s transition by calling multinational
TATA group for constructing their car factory over
fertile land. The opposition
political groups inside and outside the legislative
house and several socio-political groups
in street, had been protesting this action of the
government of acquiring land from the
peasants who were not at all willing to part with
their land under any situation. The
marginalized agrarian community largely with the
protesting group, but the state
government has decided to acquire the said land by any
mean even by applying crude
physical force and state violence and terror.

In course of acquiring of land forcefully the police
arrested nearly more than 60 people
comprising women and even children on 2.12.2006. Among
them, Jhuma Patra, daughter
of Mr. Ashok Patra of village Ghaser Veri, Singur, 12
years old and a student of class V in
Naraharipara Primary School and Soma Dhara daughter of
Sanyasi Dhara of same village,
a minor were also arrested. The fact finding team of
Masum visited the detainees at
Chandannagar Police Station. Altogether 18 women were
detained in Chandannagar
Police Station by the police authority under two
police cases being Singur Police Case nos
150 & 151 dated 2.12.2006. Both the cases the
complainant was Officer-in-Charge of
Singur Police Station, Mr. Priya Brata Baxi. In case
no. 150, according to police version,
38 persons were arrested and among them 4 were
admitted to government hospital. The
police initiated the case under sections
147/148/149/186/188/447/332/333/353/325/307 of
Indian Penal Code (IPC) & 9(b) (2) of Indian Explosive
Act (I.E. Act) with 9 W.B.M.P.O.
Act. In the Case No. 151, ten people were injured and
one police personnel also received
injury. This case was registered under sections
147/148/149/188/323/353/307 of IPC and
9(b) (2) of I.E. Act.

The Fact Finding Team of Masum visited Chuchura
Hospital, chuchura Police Station and
Chandannagar police station. During the visit, the
team met arrested persons and the
injured persons in police custody for getting the
truth. According to the arrestees, they
were unarmed and peaceful during the arrests. At the
time of arrest no memo of arrest or
inspection memo to the injured was ever prepared by
the arresting police in compliance of
the mandatory directions of Supreme Court in D.K. Basu
judgment reported in AIR 1999
SC 610. The police personnel were fully armed and
during the arrest and had severely
manhandled and brutally beaten the protestors. The
Fact Finding team also visited
Chinsura General Hospital, where four of them were
detained with severe injuries. One of
them was Dilip Das who bled profusely for hours
without any medical assistance and got
eight stitches in his scalp after many hours of his
arrest.

In the meantime, Ms. Medha Patkar was arrested with
seven other companions and she
was manhandled during her arrest and verbal abuse was
made by the police personnel,
there were no arrangement of adequate police forces to
effect the arrest. Later her
companions, Mr. Dipankar Chakraborty, Mr. Sumit
Chowdhury and others were released
on furnishing personal release bonds (PR Bond) at
Chinsura Police Station. But Ms.
Medha was whisked away in a police car and the car was
moved towards Kolkata, where
she was in the car whole night. The police announced
that she was not arrested.
Restricting the movement of a free citizen is an
arrest and the police of Singur P.S
informed her that she was arrested. Her detention and
restricting her free movement was
out and out illegal act of the police who got enough
patronization from the administration
and government to defeat the rule of law in order to
achieve the narrow end of the
administration and virtually putting the entire
democratic system into a ludicrous and
farcical one. It was utter violation spirit of Indian
Constitution particularly Art 19 and 21.

At Chandannagar Police Station at 10 pm, the fact
finding team found 18 women lying in
the front office. Names of the arrestees were:—
1. Rangta Munshi
2. Gargi Sengupta
3. Swapna Banerjee
4. Chaitali Bhattacharjee
5. Dipali Moitra
6. Sankari Koley
7. Champa Poila
8. Padma Dey
9. Tapasi Das
10. Sakuntala Das
11. Shyamali Das
12. Sabitri Patra
13. Sabitri Das
14. Soma Dhara
15. Lakshmi patra
16. Jhuma Patra
17. Sandhya Patra
18. Pratima Dey

Sl. No. 14 Soma Dhara daughter of Sanyasi Dhara of
Singur aged about 14 years and Sl.
No. 16 Jhuma daughter of Alok Patra, a student of
class five of Narasinghapur School
were amongst the arrestees lying in the floor of
office of Chandannagar PS. When asked,
the duty police officer and Officer-in-Charge of said
Chandannagar PS said that under the
order of senior officers, all these persons were kept
in detention at this PS though all the
arrested people are not connected with any offence of
Chandannagar area. Though in
Chinsura, the District Head Quarter, there was a women
cell of police, but they did not put
the female prisoners there. While talking with the
female prisoners, they jointly told the
Fact Finding team, that they were mercilessly beaten
by the police and police used with
abusive language. They leveled serious allegations
that many of the female arrestees were
manhandled molested and sexually abused by the male
men in uniform of police. The
women prisoners asked the team to supply one bottle of
drinking water as they could not
drink the water supplied by police because the bottle
was so dirty that it was unfit for
human consumption. Not a single Memo of arrest was
prepared against them.

Later, on 3/12/2006 in the morning hours, the police
could secure the release of two minor
girls, namely Miss Soma & Miss Jhuma under their set
up legal practioners on PR Bond
(Personal Release Bond) in a case under section 151 of
Cr.P.C. The rest of the female
arrestees were produced before the court of Additional
Chief Judicial Magistrate of
Chandannagar and they were given into judicial remand
till 8^th December 2006.

Our Fact Finding team also visited District Hospital
at Chinsura. The team met
1. Mr. Dilip Das -44 years
2. Mr. Mrityunjoy Patra- 52 years
3. Mr. Tapan Batabyal -53 years
4. Mr. Bilas Sarkar – 26 years

All were kept in prison ward with armed police guard
in the hospital. The team managed
to talk with the under trial prisoners there. The team
found Mr Dilip Das with bandage
over his head and the injury with 8 stitches; he was
lying in the bed in critical condition.
He informed us that the police inflicted injury on his
head and even after receiving
serious bleeding injury over his head at about 11am,
police did not take him to any doctor
for treatment. Putting him in a police car he was
brought at Chinsura Hospital at about
1.30 pm alongwith other co-injured arrested persons.

Only after about two and half hours
in police custody he got first aid. Profuse bleeding
from his injured head took place by this
time, as stated other inmates of that ward.

One police officer came to this prison ward and
threatened all these four people to sign in
the respective Memo of Arrest, but they refused
because some paragraphs were kept blank
in the memo, mainly the time of arrest.
When the team talked with Mr. Mrityunjoy Patra, he
showed his injured right leg and his
back. Mr Tapan Batabyal lying in a bed with big
haematoma both right and left legs. Mr.
Bilas Sarkar, one energetic youth with long hare
showed his injured left shoulder,
lacerated injuries and swelling over on his different
parts of the body.

Our Fact Finding team then rushed to Chinsura police
station where we found all total 10
people, all are the villagers of Beraberi, PS –
Singur, were kept in the lock-up. Their
names were –
1. Mr. Shyamal Ghosh s/o Sibram Ghosh
2. Mr. Uday Ghosh s/o Madan Mohan Ghosh
3. Mr. Birat Mlik s/o Late Gokul Malik
4. Mr. Tushar Kanti Karmakar s/o Late Jugal Kishore
Karmakar
5. Mr. Prabir Ghosh s/o Manik Ch Ghosh
6. Mr. Swapan Santra s/o Balai Chandra Santra
7. Mr. Amal Das s/o Narendra Nath Das
8. Mr. Sanat Sheet s/o Bhadreswar Sheet
9. Mr. Swarup Patra s/o Baidyanath Patra
10. Naba Kumar Bag s/o Gokul Chandra Bag

All those Under Trial Prisoners showed injury marks
over their body caused by lathi
(baton) charge. They were arrested at about 4pm at
Singur and put in Chuchura lock-up
after 8 pm. About four hours they were forced to sit
in a prison van.

Scanning the entire incident at Singur on 2.12.2006
that shook and shocked the conscience
of the democratic people, it can be safely said that
the human rights of the people were
grossly violated. The police administration swung into
barbaric violent actions ignoring
and blatantly violating legal procedures and
constitutional rights of the people with direct
encouragement and support from the highest
administration. The police have set the
democratic system into an arrogant desire of the
tyranny. By this process, all legal
procedures and rule of law were put into the state of
mockery.

The date and time of arrest was not shown correctly to
avoid of recording illegal
detention. We can not say that it is the plan / fault
of Singur police officials only, because
district and state level high police officials are in
close touch with the every tit-bits of
police action. The police had shown no respect to the
life and property of the people of the
country. The entire picture demonstrated as if the
police had been fighting in a foreign
land against the enemy.

It is the scheme of the police regulation that the
police must behave with the people with
humane face. Rudeness, harshness and brutality are
forbidden under regulation no. 33 of
Police Regulations of Bengal 1943.

The mandatory directions of the Supreme Court in D.K.
Basu judgment (AIR 1997 SC
610) have been shown scant respect by the state police
force. All the arrestees were
produced before ACJM court at Chandannagar on
3.12.2006. We are sorry to observe that
while dealing with Singur episode, the criminal
justice administration showed partisan
stand to save the violators in uniform.

The children were arrested and kept in police lock up
with other inmates and they were
released on the next day on furnishing personal bond
under total violations of the
procedure of Juvenile Justice Act.
The police exerted excessive brutal force in a
revengeful manner on the peasants and
villagers, action of which is the wildest nightmare in
any civilised society. From the
behaviour of the police and the government aftermath,
it is not at all evident that a
democratically elected system is on the run; instead
it looks like a regime run by a
tyrannic monarchy. Police, civil administration act
like henchmen of Tata group. Even in
conducting arrest the police have not followed the
provisions enumerated under sections
46(2) / 130(3) of Cr.P.C.

The citizens of a free country like India have
constitutional right to assemble peacefully
and express their views and opinions on any subject
and right to agitate peacefully.

By this process, the judiciary dealing with the police
cases arising out of Singur incident
has been threatening to become a mere executive state
agency forgetting its pivotal role at
the time of crisis, to be unbiased, neutral and
justice oriented; the attending Judicial
Magistrate toed the line of the police and without
applying judicial mind ordered the
custody of all arrested persons including the innocent
women only considering the
nomenclature of the penal code on the face of the
complaint. The judiciary has failed to
live up when it was the most urgent demand of the
situation and turned its head away
when the law of the land was flouted and abused
nakedly by the state administration and
the police.

Several International Covenants and International Laws
have been shown scant regard by
the Left ruled State administration and the police. To
be specific, we can draw United
Nations Declaration on the Right to Development (1986)
where it has been
unambiguously narrated the definition of Development
in Article 1(2) of the declaration
implies: The human right to development also implies
the full realisation of the right of
peoples to self-determination, which includes, subject
to the relevant provisions of both
International Covenants on human rights, the exercise
of their inalienable right to full
sovereignty over all their natural wealth and
resources and the UN Declaration on the
Right to Development (1986) — Article 2 (1) — The
human person is the central subject of
development and should be the active participant and
beneficiary of the right to
development.

Never it ever looked the government for a bit of
moment paused and considered the
human person has any value in its agenda. Gun
tottering, lathi wielding 6000 strong armed
forces have made Singur a battle field where a
villager has no value.

Regardless of what happened at Singur on 2.12.2006, it
is not clear actually what the
government is really going to do. There is no
transparency in taking the land by the
government, at what price the government is giving
land to the Industrialists, what should
be the actual valuation of the so called acquired
land, what will be fate of the peasants
who are solely dependant of the agricultural activity,
how the unwilling peasants to give
up land will be dealt with, nothing is clear. If
anything is done, it has to be done peacefully
and with transparency keeping the rights and the
interest of the peasants intact.

At middle Miss Jhuma is sitting, Chandan Nagar PS
office. No privacy.

On 2.12.2006 at about 11pm.
Mrityunjoy, villager & Bilas, a student of Jadavpur
University narrating their
experience, how they were tortured. Bilas’s left arm &
left shoulder is suspected
fractured / displaced. X-Ray not done.

Chuchura police station lock-up, 10 people inside, all
are residents of Ghaser Veri,
Singur. Not a single rag has been provided,
temperature 11 Celsius at 12 O’Clock
night on 2-3 December 2006.

Secretary

MASUM