Bolpur remained on the boil for the second consecutive day even as history that took shape at Bhangar near Kolkata repeated itself at Bolpur where the farmers revolted against what they said forcible conversation of a land taken for industrial purpose for promoting Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's "fanciful projects."
Farmers of local Kashipur village continued to raise slogans and burn tyres in protest even as the authorities resumed construction work for the proposed Bengal Global University amid tight security. A large contingent of police had cordoned off the 18 acre area where the proposed University a brain child of the Chief Minister is to come up.
Unlike Bhangar or Nandigram the villagers want an industry to come up in the area instead of a University. "Where is the need of a university here because we already have one in the shape of Shanitniketan set up by none other than Rabindranath Tagore. Is Didi (Banerjee) taller than Tagore or is she trying to outdo the Nobel laureate poetIJ" wondered the farmers who had "given our lands only for industrial purpose." The land is the part of 300 acres that was acquired by the erstwhile left Front Government in the year 2000 when former lok Sabha Speaker was the Chairman of West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation.
"Since then 17 years have elapsed but no industry has come up. We want our land back if no industry is set up here because we had given our land only for industrial purpose. This University will serve no purpose as you already have three such educational institutions within a hundred km radius with the one (Shantiniketan) being 15-20 km away" said locals.