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Left routed in W Bengal
Saugar Sengupta | Kolkata
Mamata scores magnificent victory
What appeared to be a wind of change turned out to be a tempest of transformation that swept the Bengal Marxists off their feet. The Congress-Trinamool Congress combine bulldozed the mighty Left Front in its own bastion of south Bengal.
Improving phenomenally on its performance in the last year's panchayat election, the Trinamool Congress wrested 19 out of 23 south Bengal seats. In the south-western districts, the Opposition did considerably well, snatching the impregnable Left bastion of Birbhum.
The Trinamool Congress leapt from its 2004 tally of one seat to 20 seats, while the Congress retained its six seats, conceding Darjeeling to BJP stalwart Jaswant Singh, who won by the highest margin of 2.53 lakh votes. Incidentally, the Gorkhaland issue came as a blessing in disguise for the CPI(M) that managed to retain the contiguous constituencies of Coochbehar, Jalpaiguri and Alipurduar.
Among the Left big guns who failed to fire were Rupchand Pal of Hooghly, Laxman Seth of Tamluk — both falling to Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee Government's aggressive land acquisition drive — Tarit Topdar of Barrackpore, Hannan Mollah of Uluberia, Sujan Chakrabarty of Jadavpur, a seat Mamata Banerjee had taken as a prestige fight. Md Selim of Kolkata North lost to Trinamool's Sudip Bandopadhyay by a huge margin of more than a lakh vote dropping clear indication that Sachar Committee report and Rizwanur Rehman factors had combined to bring about a Marxist downfall in the region.
In fact conceding defeat Selim later said, "Singur, Nandigram and Sachar Committee report played an important part in the Left debacle,” adding the poll results also suggested that the people had failed to appreciate the Left's crusade against US imperialism.
Among the notables who won are: Pranab Mukherjee, Mamata Banerjee, who increased her margin from 98,000 to 2.13 lakh, Deepa Dasmunsi, Adhir Chowdhury, film actors and Trinamool candidates Tapash Pal and Shatabdi Roy, CPI(M) leader Basudeb Acharya and Subhendu Adhikary.
The victory of Adhikary from Tamluk and Ratna Dey Nag from Hooghly seemed to vindicate Mamata's pro-land stance.
Trinamool leaders immediately interpreted the Left debacle as a mandate against its regime in West Bengal. Mamata, whose relentless anti-CPI(M) struggle, finally saw the back of the Left at least from the Lok Sabha was far more controlled in her statement giving all the credit for her party's victory to "maa, mati and manush" (people, land which one must treat as one's mother).
On demanding immediate imposition of President's rule in West Bengal, the Trinamool chief struck a cautious note saying "our course of action would be decided after we form a Government at the Centre." She exhibited a political amenability suggesting "the Congress is not as anti-Left as we have been so we will have to take their views into consideration. We will want the Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee Government to take pro-people measures otherwise the people will not tolerate them."
Party leader Parash Dutta said, "This is a referendum against the Left Front," while lawyer turned MP Kalyan Banerjee demanded "immediate resignation of Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee as he has no right to rule. If he does not resign, the people will make him do that in coming days".
While the morning started with expectant note at CPI(M)'s Alimuddin Street office, post-noon all roads led to Kalighat. By 3 pm, several thousand supporters jostled at Harish Chatterjee residence of the Trinamool leader while Alimuddin Street wore a deserted look with State CPI(M) secretary Biman Bose making a brief statement saying, "We have not performed well. We will discuss the issue in the Politburo".
Major winners and losers
Diamond Harbour - Somen Mitra - TMC defeated Samik Lahiri CPI(M) by 1.5 lakh
Kabir Suman - TMC defeated Sujan Chakrabarty of CPI(M) by 6 lakh
Tamluk - (Nandigram) Subhendu Adhikary - TMC defeated Laxman Seth CPI(M) by 1.2 lakh
Kolkata North - Sudip Bandopadhyay TMC defeated Md Selim CPI(M) by 1 lakh
Hooghly - (Singur) Ratna Nag TMC defeated Rupchand Pal by 80,000
Raiganj - Deepa Dasmunsi defeated CPI(M)'s B Lahiri by 1.2 lakh
Darjeeling - Jaswant Singh BJP defeated CPI(M)'s Jibesh Sarkar 2.53 lakh
South Kolkata - Mamata Banerjee defeated CPI(M)'s Rabin Deb 2.13 lakh
Uluberia - Sultan Ahmed of TMC defeated Hannan Mollah 98,000
Krishnagar - Tapash Pal TMC defeated CPI(M)'s Jyotirmoyee Sikdar by 79,000
Behrampore - Adhir Chowdhury of Cong defeated CPI(M) by 1 lakh
Barackpore - Dinesh Trivedi of TMC defeated Tarit Topdar CPI(M) by 34,000.
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