If Left wins, will withdraw SC case on Singur land: CPI-M

Ahead of the West Bengal assembly polls, CPI-M state secretary Surjya Kanta Mishra on Tuesday said if a left and democratic government comes to power in the state, it will withdraw from the Supreme Court the case on the land acquired for the Tata Motors factory in Singur.

"If the Left, democratic and secular government, comes to power our first priority will be to withdraw the case. There is no use continuing with it as the act in defence of which it was filed is unconstitutional," said Mishra, adding the party would "try to" set up industry at Singur in Hooghly district without harming the farmers' interest.

In June 2012, a Calcutta High Court division bench struck down the Trinamool Congress government's Singur Land Rehabilitation and Development Act, 2011, terming it "unconstitutional and void" following which the government challenged the verdict at the apex court.

Mishra said the party will work together with the farmers for establishing industry at Singur.

Singur was on the boilAbetween 2006 and 2008 after the then Left Front government acquired 997.11 acres of land for setting up the factory.

Demanding return of 400 acres to "unwilling farmers" (from whom land was allegedly taken against their will), the then opposition Trinamool led a violent and sustained movement that ultimately forced the automobile giants to shift their plant to Sanand of Gujarat.

After the Trinamool came to power and Mamata Banerjee became the chief minister in mid 2011, it passed the act for taking back the Singur land and acquired the land. But the auto makers moved the court.

Though a single bench of the Calcutta High Court ruled the act valid, a division bench declared it unconstitutional and void, and the matter is now pending before the Supreme Court.

The abandoned factory still stands in the area.