Kolkata:
Singur and Nandigram, known for the intense protests against farmland acquisition that caused the ouster of the Left Front government and propelled Mamata Banerjee to power in West Bengal, will cast its vote in the second phase of panchayat polls today.
The two rural hamlets would be part of the elections in 12,869 seats in the three-tier rural bodies spread over three districts - Hooghly, East Midnapore and Burdwan.
While 95,25,320 voters are eligible to choose their representatives in the three districts covering 10,637 gram panchayats, 2047 panchayat samitis and 185 zilla parishad seats, all eyes will be on Singur and Nandigram - which gained national and international spotlight during the Left Front's rule.
In Nandigram, about 125 km from Kolkata, the Left regime's plans to acquire 10,000 acres of land for a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) triggered violent agitation spearheaded by Ms Banerjee's Trinamool Congress in March, 2007.
The state government scrapped the project, but Trinamool rode on the anti-land acquisition protests to successfully woo large sections of the rural masses - who had for long aligned with the Left Front - and made substantial gains in the 2008 panchayat elections.
The Left, however, rapped the Trinamool for letting loose a reign of terror and preventing its candidates from filing nominations. On the other hand, the Trinamool alleged that the Leftists failed to find candidates as people have totally "deserted" them.
In Singur, where the Left Front government had acquired close to 1,000 acres for setting up a Tata Motors factory, from where the world's cheapest car Nano was scheduled to roll out, a sustained Trinamool agitation ultimately forced the automobile giants to shift their plant to Sanand in Gujarat.
The Trinamool reaped the benefits of the movement, and won the Lok Sabha elections a year later and the assembly polls with massive margins from the area.
The abandoned factory still stands like a haunted house, but the farmers are yet to get back their land due to litigation.