Reply to Mr Ratan Tata's open later.

To, Mr Ratan Tata

Through: The Editor, The Telegraph.

20/10/2008.

Dear Mr Tata,

The NANO project being pulled out of West Bengal was a painful affair for us. We wanted to see West Bengal take a giant leap in its economic growth and place itself in the country's industrial roadmap with the coming of the NANO project. We understand that the decision to pull out the NANO from our state did not come easy for the Tata Motors management. We understand that Tata Motors wanted to stay, and only pulled out with reluctance.

We Bengalis generally start conversations with some statement about the weather: "Oh, it's so hot!" is a very common conversation starter. These days, the standard refrain between people has become: "NANO tahole gelo!" (The NANO was pulled out, after all!). I don't know about the so called "unwilling farmers", but the larger section of the people of West Bengal were appalled at the way Mamata Banerjee and her supporters opposed the Tata Motors plant at Singur. She was agitating for agitation's sake. She was not ready to listen to reason. She was not ready to negotiate. Street politics, threats and violence appeared to be the doctrine of her party, which she
followed religiously.

We do not support this kind of agitation. What little respect we had for her as a leader of opposition, we have lost. She did not feel the nerve of the people of West Bengal. We wanted the plant to come up. West Bengal had received a cold shoulder from industrialists for long. The present State Government is trying to change that. We wanted to see that change happen, and we hoped the NANO project would be the pioneer of that change. That's not to say that we are bidding goodbye to agriculture. But we realise that agriculture alone will not lead to future prosperity. Industry, which brings with it economic growth and employment, education and infrastructure, and an upliftment of living standards, in harmony with agriculture, is the path to future prosperity of West Bengal.
We had hoped the NANO plant would be the harbinger of such a future.

When I say "we", I include in this many of my friends who I know are of the same view as I, and also many, many others who I'm sure will be able to identify themselves with what I have written in this letter.

We support the present Government of Mr Budhdhadeb Bhattarjee's attempt "to build a prosperous state with the rule of law, modern infrastructure and industrial growth, supporting a harmonious investment in the agricultural sector". We hope that the TATAs have not lost all of the tremendous faith they showed in West Bengal when they invested here. We hope that they will invest again in future, and we, the citizens of West Bengal, will take the responsibility to
carry the state forward, via the path of industrialisation, and, simultaneously, harmonious agricultural growth. Without losing focus from agriculture.

Yours sincerely,

Arunava Chatterjee.
4th year, Computer Science and Engineering,

Some Engineering College (Name withheld for potential personal safety reasons.)