KOLKATA: If there is any one constituency that will keep the country engrossed, it is Basirhat. This seat comprises Sandeshkhali, which hit the headlines after local women rose in revolt against sexual exploitation and land-grab by TMC leaders.
Despite disillusionment with the Trinamool Congress after revelations of multiple scams, the BJP and the resurgent Left may come up short due to their organisational weaknesses in many marquee constituencies that go to the polls in the last phase of elections on June 1. The BJP may not be able to get the full benefit of the Narendra Modi government’s performance due to the state unit’s chronic inability to put in place a good booth-level organisation.
BASIRHAT
If there is any one constituency that will keep the country engrossed on results day, 4 June, it is Basirhat.
This Lok Sabha seat comprises Sandeshkhali, a small riverine island close to the India-Bangladesh border which hit national and international headlines after local women rose in revolt against sexual exploitation and land-grab by Trinamool Congress leaders.
In an inspired choice, the BJP named Rekha Patra, the first woman who mustered courage to lodge a formal complaint against Sheikh Shahjahan and his associates. Prime Minister Narendra Modi personally called up the 31-year-old wife of a migrant worker and called her “Shakti Swaroopa”.
The BJP, long seen as a party of traders and the well-off, has also won brownie points with the general people across the state for nominating Patra, whose assets combined with her husband, is a meagre Rs 6000.
While the feisty mother of three small children who has only studied till Class V, has put up a spirited campaign in the searing summer heat, the moot question is whether she will get enough support in the constituency which has been voting overwhelmingly for the Trinamool Congress election after election since 2009, regardless of the candidate.
The Basirhat Lok Sabha seat comprises seven Assembly segments—Baduria, Haroa, Minakhan (SC), Sandeshkhali (ST), Basirhat Dakshin, Basirhat Uttar, Hingalganj (SC)—all of which have elected Trinamool MLAs in the last election.
The 47% Muslim population in this constituency has led to the Trinamool always naming a Muslim candidate here. In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, Basirhat elected actor Nusrat Jahan Ruhi who had received 55% of the votes trouncing BJP’s Sayantan Basu who received just 30%.
However, there was widespread dissatisfaction with Nusrat’s non-performance and absence and after the Sandeshkhali issue blew up, the Trinamool Congress named Haji Sk. Nurul Islam as its candidate to take on Rekha Patra. At the same time, the party launched a no-holds barred campaign to discredit the women’s agitation and paint it as a BJP conspiracy.
Haji Sk. Nurul Islam was the Trinamool Congress Lok Sabha member from Basirhat from 2009 to 2014 but the party refused to re-nominate him in 2014 following allegations of his involvement in the 2010 Deganga riots in North 24 Parganas. An FIR was registered against him then and Islam is contesting with the shadow of the 2010 riots still chasing him. Haji Sk. Nurul Islam has also served as a member of gram panchayat and zilla panchayat before making his way into the Lower House of Indian Parliament in 2009.
The second jolt for the Trinamool Congress was in the choice of Left Front candidate from Basirhat, the CPM’s Nirapada Sardar, who is himself a former party MLA from Sandeshkhali. He is the current secretary of the All India Agricultural Workers Union (AIAWU). Sardar had attempted to organise the people at Sandeshkhali against the land grabbing and forceful conversion of farmland into pisciculture farms by suspended Trinamool Congress leader, Sheikh Shahjahan.
Nirapada Sardar was even arrested by the West Bengal police on charges of instigating the people of Sandeshkhali, only to be released soon after the Calcutta High Court slammed the police for overreacting.
Another factor that is causing problems for the Trinamool Congress is the decision of the All India Secular Front (AISF), which despite its name, is seen as a Muslim party, to field a candidate from Basirhat. Political observers say that if the AISF’s Aktar Ali Biswas is able to make a substantial dent in the minority vote bank that consolidated in favour of the Trinamool Congress in the last three Lok Sabha polls, the situation will be tougher for the ruling party.
Despite the odds stacked against her, BJP’s Rekha Patra herself is unfazed. “I will fight till the finish to bring an end to the oppression and violence against women in the area which had been going on for a long time,” said Patra, who is being chaperoned and coached by senior BJP leaders.
Regardless of the poll outcome, Rekha Patra is being hailed for her courage for standing against her oppressors.
KOLKATA DAKSHIN
Out of 543 parliamentary seats in the country, Kolkata Dakshin has a unique feature: Five of the MLAs from its seven Assembly Constituencies which make up this Lok Sabha seat were members of the Mamata Banerjee Cabinet till one of them went to jail for his alleged role in selling government jobs.
This list comprises Mamata Banerjee herself who is the Bhabanipur MLA, Firhad Hakim who represents Kolkata Port, Javed Ahmed Khan from Kasba and Babul Supriyo from Ballygunge. Former state Education Minister and Trinamool Congress secretary general, Partha Chatterjee is the sitting legislator from Behala-Paschim. He is under arrest for his alleged role in masterminding the sale of government jobs.
The Lok Sabha candidate from the Trinamool Congress is the sitting MP Mala Roy, a long-time Mamata Banerjee confidante who is also the chairperson of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation.
Since 1991, this constituency has been supporting Mamata Banerjee and her party—first the Congress and later on the Trinamool Congress.
Mamata Banerjee, is not just a voter from and resident of Kolkata-Dakshin, but she was also an elected MP from here for six consecutive terms since 1991, before she resigned in 2011 after becoming CM. So Mamata’s long political and emotional connect with this constituency has always kept Kolkata-Dakshin in the spotlight.
Given this heavyweight presence and consequent nursing, Dakshin Kolkata is one seat in which the ruling Trinamool Congress can expect a comfortable victory despite signs of anti-incumbency.
On the other hand, this time, the BJP has fielded Debasree Chaudhuri, its sitting Lok Sabha member from Raiganj Lok Sabha constituency in North Dinajpur district from Kolkata-Dakshin.
With Kolkata-Dakshin being an unknown turf for her, Debasree Chaudhuri is depending on the slogans of development under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, to catch the attention of the voters of the constituency.
Also in the fray is CPM’s Saira Shah Halim, the niece of iconic actor Naseeruddin Shah and daughter of former Deputy Chief of Army Staff, Lieutenant General Zameer Uddin Shah (Retired). Saira Shah Halim, before joining politics was a business development and communications trainer with the West Bengal Electronics Industry Development Corporation Limited. After marriage, she inherited the legacy of Marxist leanings as her husband Dr Fuad Halim, is a popular leader of the CPM. Dr Fuad Halim’s father, the late Hashim Abdul Halim, was the longest-serving Speaker of the West Bengal Assembly from 1982 to 2011.
History favours the Trinamool Congress in this constituency.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, Mala Roy won the seat with a margin of 155,192 votes. She polled 573,119 votes with a vote share of 47.50% and defeated Chandra Kumar Bose from BJP who got 417,927 votes (34.62 %).
In the 2014 Lok Sabha Elections, Subrata Bakshi from TMC won the seat and polled 431,715 votes with a vote share of 36.95%. BJP candidate Tathagata Roy got 295,376 votes (25.28%) and was the runner-up. Subrata Bakshi defeated Tathagata Roy by a margin of 136,339 votes.
In such a situation the only headache for Mala Roy is whether she will be able to retain her 2019 Lok Sabha poll winning margin of 155,000 votes despite the myriad corruption of her party. She will however get the benefit of the BJP not having a sizeable on-ground presence.
JADAVPUR
The middle-class dominated Jadavpur Lok Sabha constituency will witness a triangular contest between an actor, a scholar and a Young Turk during the upcoming Lok Sabha election.
Political stalwarts like the former Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee and the current West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee have both been elected as MPs from the Jadavpur Lok Sabha seat in the past.
Since 2009, the Trinamool Congress has been comfortably winning this constituency but every time the party had to choose a different candidate. The party has now fielded actress-turned-politician Saayoni Ghosh.
In 2009, the party candidate singer-turned-politician Kabir Suman got elected with a thumping majority only to be replaced by historian Sugata Bose in 2014 general elections, who is the grandnephew of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose.
In 2019, Trinamool Congress replaced Bose and fielded actress-turned-politician Mimi Chakraborty.
For 2024, Mimi declined re-nomination, and Trinamool fielded Saayoni Ghosh.
The two common complaints against both Kabir Suman and Mimi Chakraborty were their rare availability within the constituency to address the grievances of the common voters and negligible participation in Parliamentary debates.
The question remains whether Ghosh will be different from her predecessors or will continue to face the same complaints from voters and critics.
Ghosh has said that she realises the responsibility of an MP which is much beyond making trips to the national capital at the cost of public exchequer. She also said that she is aware of the importance of being present at the Parliament and highlighting public issues.
The other challenges for her are the strong candidates fielded by both the BJP and the CPM.
BJP has fielded scholar-turned-politician and author Anirban Ganguly from Jadavpur. Ganguly is a member of the BJP central thinktank and heads the Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee Research Foundation. Ganguly completed his school education in Pondicherry and then his higher education and Ph.D from Jadavpur University. He claims that he has lived in various areas under Jadavpur Lok Sabha constituency and says he understands the problems of the middle and lower-middle classes of this constituency who are mostly refugees from erstwhile East Pakistan.
Ganguly had unsuccessfully contested from Bolpur Assembly constituency in Birbhum district in the 2021 Assembly polls. However, despite being defeated, Ganguly was able to improve the vote share of BJP to almost 41%, from a paltry 9.46% in the 2016 Assembly polls.
“The previous Trinamool Congress MPs from Jadavpur forgot the people of the constituency after getting elected. So, I am appealing to voters to select any candidate this time who will be with them round the year after getting elected and also highlight their grievances in Parliament,” Ganguly told The Sunday Guardian.
Equally strong is the CPM’s Young Turk and former state president of the party’s student wing SFI, Srijan Bhattacharya. An alumnus of the iconic Jadavpur University, Bhattacharya’s links with Jadavpur constituency since his days of student politics has been quite in-depth.
“Jadavpur, being thoroughly middle-class dominated with a sizable population of people coming from erstwhile East Bengal after partition had been traditionally left-inclined for a long time. My only target is to revive that ‘Red Fort’ and I will leave no stone unturned for that. An ideal MP from Jadavpur should have a thorough knowledge of the aspirations of the voters of the constituency,” he says.
The Jadavpur seat comprises the Assembly segments of Baruipur Purba, Baruipur Paschim, Sonarpur Dakshin, Bhangore, Jadavpur, Sonarpur Uttar and Tollygunge.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Mimi Chakraborty from the Trinamool Congress won the seat with a margin of 295,239 votes. Mimi Chakraborty polled 688,472 votes with a vote share of 48.00% and defeated Anupam Hazra from the BJP who got 393,233 votes (27.36%).
In the 2014 Lok Sabha Elections, Sugata Bose from the Trinamool Congress won the seat and polled 584,244 votes with a vote share of 45.83%. CPM candidate Sujan Chakraborty got 459,041 votes (36.01%) and was the runner-up.
Despite widespread disillusionment with the Trinamool Congress following revelations of multiple scams, in Jadavpur, the party seems to have an edge due to its well-oiled organisation network, while the BJP and a resurgent Left will put up a spirited fight for second place.
DUM DUM
For the BJP, the Dum Dum seat holds an emotional place. This was the first Lok Sabha seat that the party won in West Bengal when Tapan Sikdar won the seat in 1998 and 1999 Lok Sabha elections in alliance with the newly formed Trinamool Congress, leading the formation of the Atal Behari Vajpayee government.
This is perhaps the only constituency in the West Bengal polls which will see a fight between grizzled veterans of their respective parties. Dum Dum, with a strength of over 15 lakh voters, is basically a middle class-dominated constituency with a substantial population of refugee voters who had come to India from erstwhile East Pakistan post-Partition.
The Dum Dum Lok Sabha seat comprises the Assembly segments of Khardaha, Dumdum Uttar, Panihati, Kamarhati, Baranagar, Dumdum, Rajarhat-Gopalpur. However, Baranagar MLA Tapas Roy has since quit to contest as a BJP candidate from the Kolkata Uttar Lok Sabha seat.
Before the Trinamool Congress announced its pick, partymen had been speculating that 78-year-old Saugata Roy was on the verge of being retired. However, he managed to get the backing of Mamata Banerjee and Abhishek Banerjee, to contest again.
For the Trinamool Congress’ three-time MP since 2009 from Dum Dum, Saugata Roy, the concern is his winning margin in 2019 which came down sharply to 52,999 from 154,934 in 2014.
The second factor that might be a cause of concern for Saugata Roy is that the CPM this time has fielded party veteran and central committee member, Sujan Chakraborty, from Dum Dum, where his party still has a dedicated voter base.
In case Sujan Chakraborty, with his vast experience in party organisation activities as well as electoral politics, is able to grab a substantial share of the anti-BJP votes from Dum Dum, it could be rough going for Saugata Roy.
65-year-old Sujan Chakraborty, in his public outreach, has been asking people in his constituency about their expectation from him, seeking their opinion on development in the area. Most of the exercise is based on virtual feedback, where flex banners and personal messages are being used to take his request across. He is perhaps the only candidate to talk about environment and climate change, showing concern over the depleting wetlands in east Kolkata.
The BJP has fielded Shilbhadra Dutta, who, as an erstwhile Trinamool Congress leader from North 24 Parganas district, has substantial experience in handling the ruling party’s organisational affairs there.
Shilbhadra Dutta joined the BJP before the 2021 West Bengal Assembly polls and also contested unsuccessfully as the party’s candidate from Barrackpore Assembly constituency that year. However, he was one of the few who did not re-join the Trinamool Congress even after being defeated, which substantially enhanced his political credibility.
Considering the twin-factors of Saugata Roy’s fluctuating victory margins and the strong anti-incumbency wave against the Trinamool Congress this time, it can be said that the battle for the ruling party candidate and the retired professor of Physics will not be an easy one this time.
One worry for the Trinamool high command is that while Saugata Roy has managed to ingratiate himself with party supremo Mamata Banerjee and second-in-command, his abrasive behaviour with the party’s rank and file has rubbed too many people the wrong way in his Lok Sabha constituency. Due to this, many Trinamool workers may not give their best on polling day.
Since 1977, none of the parties have managed to retain the seat for more than three consecutive terms and going by that logic Saugata Roy, too, has reached the optimum level of Dum Dum’s victory records.