Singur returns to spotlight ahead of Modi’s Jan 18 rally
Times of India | 15 January 2026
Singur: Ahead of PM Narendra Modi's scheduled Jan 18 rally at Singur's Singher Bheri mouza, a portion of land that was at the centre of a bitter industry-versus-land conflict 20 years ago has returned to the political centre-stage ahead of the 2026 assembly elections.
Bengal BJP has promised it will "bring Tata back to Singur" if it forms the govt in the state, with junior Union minister and BJP senior Sukanta Majumdar saying on Wednesday that Singur symbolised Bengal's "lost opportunity for industrialisation".
Trinamool immediately hit back with a "correction". "Singur was never about Tata or industrialisation. The Tatas are heavily invested in Bengal. Singur was about a larger struggle led by Mamata Banerjee against the principle of a state forcibly acquiring multi-crop cultivable land and giving it to private industry," party spokesperson Kunal Ghosh said.
"Majumdar is new to politics. His (then) party president Rajnath Singh had backed Banerjee at the did, as did Congress, and a large section of Left and even ultra-Left parties. People across India acknowledged Banerjee for it. Even his BJP colleagues were part of the agitation," Ghosh added.
BJP seniors have argued that while Singur delivered political change, it also ushered in an era of industrial stagnation.
"Industrialisation left Bengal the day Tata was forced to leave. PM Modi is coming now, and in the future, Tata will also return. But for that, Bengal needs a change of govt," Majumdar said.
"Since Nano left Singur, Bengal hasn't seen a single major industrial project. Small and medium units were set up, but no big factory," Majumdar said. Invoking the legacy of the late industrialist Ratan Tata, Majumdar termed the exit of the project a "stigma" on Singur and promised that BJP would erase it by facilitating industrial investments if voted to power.
Bengal finance minister Chandrima Bhattacharya referred to the Supreme Court verdict which stamped the Mamata Banerjee-led govt's decision to return acquired land to unwilling farmers. "The highest court said land acquisition in Singur was wrong. Where were these netas when farmers were beaten and land was forcibly taken?" she asked.
Singur occupies a singular place in Bengal's political history. In May 2006, the Left Front govt signed an agreement with Tata Group to set up a car factory, acquiring nearly 1,000 acres of multi-crop agricultural land.
A prolonged agitation by unwilling farmers followed, led by then opposition leader Mamata Banerjee, who turned Singur into a symbol of resistance.
Marked by police action, arrests and Banerjee's 21-day hunger strike, the agitation snowballed into a wider political movement culminating in Tata Motors pulling out of Singur in 2008 and relocating the project to Sanand in Gujarat.