Elections over, Nandigram back to its own self

After facing the glare of spotlights for over a month, people of Nandigram appeared to breathe easy on Friday and returned to normal life.

Three boys aged between seven and nine, played hide-and-seek near Boyal Maqtab Primary School that had been the scene of taut tension on Thursday as a group of Hindus and Muslims braced for a face-off and forced chief minister Mamata Banerjee to remain in the school’s corridor for two hours. Now, away from political pressure and the media glare, the men and women, who had been at each other’s throat till a day before, appeared to set aside their aggressive stance as they went about their daily lives. Even the central forces left by buses around 11.30pm. At Nandigram bazar, those who had walked in rival rallies and voted for opposite sides rubbed shoulders on Saturday. While the campaign had rhetoric that appeared to polarize the people, the fissures weren’t visible.

The only trouble that broke out on Friday was a fracas between BJP and TMC supporters at Bhimkanta in Boyal 1. Police and RAF defused the tension.


“The Muslims may have voted for one party and some Hindus for another, but there is no real divide in our daily lives. If that were so, our lives would change and we would become poorer. For every Muslim that steps into my shop, I get three Hindus,” said Jamaluddin Mullick (23) of Asadtalia in Nandigram I. A fruit-seller said him being a Hindu never stopped Muslims from buying from him, especially during Ramzan. Neither does a Hindu woman think twice about buying fruits for pujas from a Muslim vendor.