A Bonfire Of Defectors

Leaders switching camps after being denied election tickets have been a common trend in Indian politics, though it is relatively recent in West Bengal. But a leader switching camp even after bagging a ticket is unprecedented. So, when Sarala Murmu decided to join the BJP a day after she was named a Trinamool Congress (TMC) candidate from the Habibpur constituency in Malda district, it presaged new surprises in ­election-bound Bengal.

Murmu was named a candidate on March 5; news broke on March 7 about her suspicious visit to Calcutta; TMC named a new candidate on the morning of March 8, and in the evening Murmu formally joined the BJP along with ­several members of Malda Zilla Parishad (district council). Yet the ­situation is mysteriously fluid—Murmu did not get any BJP ticket, and of the 14 Parishad members who joined the BJP along with her, three later announced that they had not quit the TMC and that Murmu had spread misinformation about them.

A few days later, it was the BJP’s turn to be embarrassed. On the afternoon of March 17, BJP national general secretary Arun Singh and Union minister Debashree Chaudhury announced the names of 148 candidates for West Bengal. Within hours, two of them, both from Calcutta, told journalists that they never wanted to be BJP candidates. More dramatically, they said they never joined the BJP in the first place.

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One of them, Shikha Mitra, is the wife of the late Bengal Congress stalwart Somen Mitra; the other is Tarun Saha, husband of the TMC’s MLA of 10 years Mala Saha, who has been denied a ticket. The BJP is yet to name their replacements. This incident was highlighted as an example of the BJP’s desperation to fill its candidate list with disgruntled leaders from the TMC, the Left and the Congress. Mitra, who is not contesting the election, received a congratulatory phone call from Congress chairperson Sonia Gandhi for standing up to the BJP.

More astonishing things were to ­transpire. Santanu Bapuli wrote on Facebook sometime after he was named a BJP candidate from Raidighi: “Today, I have accepted the BJP’s membership.” Then, the party named economist Ashok Lahiri as candidate from Alipurduars, without knowing that he was not a voter in Bengal, and thus ­ineligible to contest. However, Lahiri soon got his name enr­o­lled in the state’s voter list and was later named a candidate from Dakshin Dinajpur district, which is going to the polls in a later phase.

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On March 19, two weeks after the TMC announced its list of 291 candidates, they changed four more candidates—from Kalyani in Nadia district, Ashoknagar and Amdanga in North 24-Parganas and Dubrajpur in Birbhum.  No reason was cited, but senior TMC leaders say local grievances against the candidates forced the party’s hand. These instances, perhaps, encouraged some TMC leaders. On March 21, TMC workers in Jalangi in Murshidabad ­district staged demonstrations for two days, demanding a similar change.

However, grievances in the BJP over its candidate list far outdid others. Several BJP leaders have already quit the ­org­anisation protesting the selection, ­including state committee member Bhaskar Bhattacharya, former Hooghly unit president Subir Nag, state vice-president Rajkamal Pathak and youth wing general secretary Sourav Sikdar. In Singur, after the BJP named as their candidate 89-year-old Rabindra­nath Bhattacharya, a four-time MLA from the seat who quit the TMC after being denied a ticket citing his old age, BJP workers staged a day-long demonstration at a lodge where senior leaders were staying. At Kalyani in Nadia district, unhappy workers started a ­hungerstrike on a dais erected ­overnight. And protests erupted in Pandaveshwar in West Burdwan, where the party fielded Jitendra Tiwari.

The case of Tiwari embodies the strange inter-party twists being seen in Bengal. A political heavyweight who was the TMC’s district unit ­president, Asansol mayor and Pandaveshwar MLA, Tiwari started hobnobbing with Suvendu Adhikary in December, just before Adhikary joined the BJP. He ­resigned from the TMC, but his entry into the BJP was blocked by some party leaders, who argued that it was by fighting against him that the BJP fared well in the district. Scraping and bowing before Mamata Banerjee, Tiwari then ­returned to the TMC, but won the role of a mere spokesperson. In a couple of weeks, BJP central ­leaders managed to calm the situation. Tewari joined the BJP in March and was named the Pandaveshwar ­candidate, triggering unrest among local BJP workers.

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Elsewhere too, BJP workers are aghast at the choice of candidates. At Jalpaiguri, they ­vandalised a party office and set it afire. In Hooghly’s Uttarpara, they have threatened to put up an independent candidate after the party fielded Prabir Ghosh, the TMC’s MLA. Agitations were reported from Khandaghosh in East Burdwan and Gangarampur and Harirampur in South Dinajpur. The heat of these grievances reached the BJP’s state unit office in Calcutta, where senior leaders faced the wrath of aggrieved workers.

Expectedly, the TMC pointed out gleefully how their adversary was ­“falling apart”. “The BJP fielded those we had discarded in such great ­numbers that their old-timers are up in arms. People have never witnessed such large-scale agitation over ticket distribution. It seems their own ­workers will ensure the defeat of their candidates,” said TMC Lok Sabha MP Sougata Roy.  

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The BJP, however, is not budging from their candidate list. “The seats where we fielded newcomers from the TMC were dicey and we need to ­ensure breaching the TMC’s vote-share,” a state unit leader argues. State unit president Dilip Ghosh also made a counter-intuitive argument--that grievances over ticket distribution were indicative of the party’s growing popularity. “Five years ago, it was ­difficult for us to get candidates in all 294 seats. Now, there are several ­contenders for each seat. Does this not reflect how the party has gained ­significance? We are on the verge of creating history,” Ghosh said.

The trend of malcontent TMC lea­ders joining the BJP got a boost after the 2019 Lok Sabha polls—not only because the BJP won 18 of the state’s 42 seats, but also because several TMC turncoats, including MP Saumitra Khan, MLA Arjun Singh and expelled youth wing leader Nishith Pramanik went on to win on a BJP ticket.

This time too, a ­number of TMC MLAs who were unlikely to be re-nominated joined the BJP since last Dece­m­ber. Of them, ­several got tickets, while some, like Sonali Guha and Bac­ch­chu Hansda, did not. Hansda, an ­outgoing minister, later said he was misled into joining the BJP. Former minister Syama Prasad Mukherjee ­followed Suvendu Adhikary into the BJP, but did not get a ticket. His ­subsequent endeavour to return to the TMC fold was brutally snubbed.

Political observers say the situation reflects leaders’ inability to understand the mood of the people. Going by the assembly segment-wise result of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP led in 121 of the 294 assembly segments, as against 164 by the TMC. Since then, BJP and TMC have shared in the fav­ourable trade winds that buffet a pre-poll season. Right now, no one seems to be sure which boat looks more dependable to sail in through the elections.

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Poll Pot

• 8 candidates for the Nandigram seat include four ­independents. This is the first time since 2006 that independents filed nominations here.

With Ex-CPI Father By His Side

In the fight for reputation in West Bengal’s Nandigram, a son is fighting a personal battle to restore the lost honour of his father. Sheikh ­Saddam Hossain, 28, is contesting as an independent against the likes of chief minister Mamata Banerjee and her one-time lieutenant Suvendu Adhikari, who switched over to the BJP recently. Hossain’s father Mohammed Ilyas, a former two-time CPI MLA, had to resign in 2007 after he was filmed taking a bribe from an NGO in a TV channel sting. The son dismisses the allegation, saying his father was framed by a local ­politician when the anti-land ­acquisition ­movement of 2007 was bearing down on the State and the ruling Left. He accuses the CPI as well as the Left Front of betraying his father. But he bore no grudge and remained loyal to the CPI until a few days ago. He quit when he found out the CPI has given the seat to the CPI(M). With his father by his side, Hossain now takes the fight to the titans—alone.

By Snigdhendu Bhattacharya in Calcutta