With her penchant for breaking traditions, Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee continued with her Independence Day experiments this time getting a lavishly decorated tableaux ferry a section of Bengal intelligentsia in the Independence Day march-past organised at the Indira Gandhi Sarani more popularly known as the Red Road in Kolkata.
While the tableaux carried a galaxy of stars including singers and poets many other Bengali cine stars marched behind the decorated vehicle. Banerjee had last year broken the tradition for the first time since Independence unfurling the National Flag at the Red Road instead of the colonial Writers’ Buildings. Earlier the march-pasts were organised on the Republic Days only. The Thursday’s tableaux depicted Bengal’s folk art and tribal dances.
The Chief Minister who on Thursday inspected a guard of honour and witnessed a sequence of splendidly decorated tableaux some from the Bengal Police, Eastern Frontier Rifle and others from schools and various State Departments earlier saluted “our nation, freedom fighters, countrymen, jawans, kisans and sisters and all our maa maati manush” calling upon all and sundry to serve the people. She said patriotism did not signify crass emotion but a passion to serve the people of the country.
“Practical patriotism means not mere sentiment or even an emotion or love of the motherland but a passion to serve our fellow countrymen,” Banerjee said quoting Swami Vivekananda. Curiously the Government tended to send out a subtle political message to the pro-Gorkhaland activists of Darjeeling by organising Gorkha dances but from the Dooars and the Terrain regions and not from Darjeeling proper.
This was made evident when the announcement before the dance was to take place specifically mentioned about the Gorkha art form of the Dooars region. Also for the first time the Government organised a function of the lepchas who constitute a minority in Darjeeling but have for long been demanding autonomy.
“There is a clear message from the Chief Minister to the people of the Hills that though they are asking for a separate State on the basis of what they call cultural oneness all people of Darjeeling do not share the same culture,” said a Minister who was also present in the function.