To signal the successful completion of India's first nuclear test at Pokhran on May 18, 1974, the then Atomic Energy Commission chairman Homi Sethna is supposed to have sent a message to Indira Gandhi: "The Buddha is smiling." This is a fine but apocryphal story. How, for West Bengal's sake, were it to be true today. Alas, it is not so and Buddha's flame in Kolkata flickers unsteadily.

Last weekend, while the nation awaited the election results to the four state assemblies, a historic meeting took place in Kolkata. This was the 20th conference of the West Bengal CPI(M) held as a precursor to the 17th triennial national CPI(M) Party Congress to be held in Hyderabad on March 22. Over 100 delegates among the 532 assembled discussed a most unusual document titled The Left Front and Our Tasks, which has been authored primarily by Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya and Industry Minister Nirupam Sen and enjoys the backing of Anil Biswas, ostensibly the most powerful CPI(M) leader in the state. Sen introduced the document with the usual quotes from Mao but interestingly also quoted Deng Xiaoping and Zhu Rongji and Bhattacharya responded to the debate.

The document is a roadmap for economic and political governance and seeks to wrest autonomy for the CPI(M) Government in the state from the party, its cadres and its trade unions. This is the first time such an attempt has been made. It is by no means revolutionary. By Chinese standards or even by standards of some other progressive states in peninsular India, its recommended reform doses are homoeopathic. For example, it talks only of privatisation of loss-making state enterprises. But its significance lies in the clear recognition of the need to shed ideological shibboleths and for Bengal to do things differently if it is to move forward and fulfil the aspirations of the younger generation. Predictably, the delegates objected vociferously. Over 60 amendments were made. Basically, the carte blanche the chief minister was seeking from his party for carrying out far-reaching reforms was denied to him.

Bhattacharya's initiative comes close on the heels of a series of four articles written in the local media by Bengali "navratnas", nine outstanding economists, all social democrats, who earned their laurels outside their home state. They include Abhijit Banerjee (MIT), Pranab Bardhan (University of California, Berkeley), Kaushik Basu (Cornell and MIT), Mrinal Datta-Chaudhuri (Delhi School of Economics), Maitreesh Ghatak (University of Chicago), Ashok Sanjay Guha (JNU), Mukul Majumdar (Cornell), Dilip Mookherjee (Boston University) and Debraj Ray (Boston University). They laid out a blueprint for the industrial revival of Bengal based on the Chinese model of "people's capitalism". The blueprint has been criticised but it has also been hailed by none other than D. Bandyopadhyay, one of Bengal's most distinguished civil servants who played a key role in the Left Front's agrarian reforms. What the economists should have pointed out is that India's small-scale, fiscal and labour policies are killing labour-intensive industrialisation of the Chinese type here-and Bengal has been an enthusiastic accomplice in this national harakiri.

Undoubtedly, there has been a rural metamorphosis in West Bengal over the past three decades starting with the implementation of land ceiling laws by the two United Front governments during 1967-70, the empowerment of panchayats beginning 1978 and thereafter radical land reforms. These triggered very impressive agricultural growth; for example, Bengal is now the nation's top rice producer and second largest producer of potatoes. But all these achievements are contradicted by urban decay and industrial decline, largely the consequences of the CPI(M)'s own policies. Education has been thoroughly politicised and is drowning in mediocrity while students flock to other states. Since the mid-1970s, Bengal has been overtaken by Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh.

For the time being, Bhattacharya has compromised and accepted a diluted version of his agenda. This could well be a political tactic designed to expand the canvas of consensus and give his colleagues a sense of participation. He may have settled for a small window of opportunity for now. But soon he will have to take on his opponents frontally. This is what his Congress counterpart in Kerala, A.K. Antony, is doing courageously. Bhattacharya and Antony share many characteristics. They are two of India's most honest politicians. They were both prisoners of the past till they became chief ministers. It is then that from being dogmatic they became pragmatic. Both are becoming zealous modernisers of decrepit systems they preside over. Both are facing formidable resistance, from within and without. And both represent the last chance for their states, states that have done India proud in the past but which now desperately need the duo to succeed.