NANDIGRAM (India): For these Indian villagers, out of the jaws of victory came a far worse defeat. When the communist government of West Bengal state backed down on seizing their land for an industrial complex, it was seen as a victory for poor farmers opposing the unstoppable juggernaut that the Asian giant’s economy appears to be.

But now, the usually bustling mud roads running through dozens of villages in Nandigram in eastern India are deserted and the area dotted with red communist flags, emblems of a government that had wanted this fertile land for a chemicals complex.

Close to 2,000 displaced villagers, many of them minority Muslims, are living in unhealthy conditions in refugee camps, saying they are too afraid to return home.

They blame a reign of terror by the communist government and its party cadres who have now retaken control.

“It is hell on earth, we are living like prisoners in a free country,” said Sabuj Pradhan, struggling to hold back his tears.

“We have seen how cadres raped our women and said it was payback time for daring to defy the government,” said Pradhan, 40, sitting in a corner of a high school that has been turned into a refugee camp on the outskirts of Nandigram.

Farmlands, where canals take water from the nearby river to irrigate fields of paddy, mustard and potato, were empty.

Fish-farming pools which dot the countryside and supplement incomes lay unattended. Witnesses said all the men had fled to avoid being beaten or killed.

West Bengal, of which Kolkata is the capital, has been roiled by protests over the killing of Nandigram villagers by suspected communist cadres in a turf battle that began earlier this year.

The army was called into Kolkata on Wednesday after rioting broke out.

It has become a major crisis for the ruling communists, who shore up India’s federal coalition government. It threatens, some analysts say, to damage the left’s electoral prospects.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh dispatched federal police to Nandigram last week. They were seen patrolling amid the ruins of burned houses.

The communists have denied all charges, saying that many of their supporters had merely returned home.

“Allegations of torture have been cooked up,” said Naba Kumar Samanta, a Nandigram communist leader.

The communists lost control of Nandigram in January after trying, unsuccessfully, to get villagers to vacate their land.

Local opposition parties and Maoist rebels then moved in after villagers dug up roads and burned communist party offices.

This month, communist party cadres broke that resistance by forcing their way in and shooting at villagers, locals said.

Those who remained were forced to put up traditional hammer-and-sickle flags on their mud and bamboo shacks or face torture by bike-riding cadres, who terrorise them at night, witnesses said.

“We were forced to submit in writing that we will take part in communist rallies,” said 83-year-old Mujib Sheikh.

Although officials and the communist government said that only six people had been killed in this month’s violence, bringing the toll to 34 since January, some witnesses fear many more deaths have been concealed.

“I saw them drag away my injured father along with four others last week. I have not been able to trace him until now,” said farmer Tapan Gol, 28, as his mother stood crying nearby.

A group of 50 villagers who tried returning home came back to the camp on Thursday, saying that cadres had insisted they pay a fine of $130 or risk being thrown out or raped.

“We cannot deny that there has been rape and torture before we arrived ... a few stray cases are reported even now,” said Alok Raj, a senior federal police official.

“The fear is in their minds and psyche of the people now, it will take a long time to heal and for them to return home.”—Reuters