Can victory make Mamata Banerjee a central figure in Indian national politics?
A popular and prominent political figure among the Indian political firmament, she has often stood out in a crowd with her strikingly upright posture, attributed to her skill as a mass-people politician
By Anwar A. Khan
Trinamool Congress (TMC) Chief Mamata Banerjee has been sworn in as West Bengal Chief Minister for the third consecutive time. On Monday last, she met Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar and laid claims to forming the next government in the eastern India state of West Bengal.
After winning a two-thirds majority, taking more than 200 seats in the 294-seat state assembly, Mamata Banerjee is now coalescing her position in Indian national politics.
For the 66-year-old Mamata Banerjee, the political journey from the restive alleys of Nandigram and Singur in 2007-08, when she waged a relentless battle against the Left Front government, to ‘Nabanna’, the seat of power in Kolkata, was as captivating as it was punishing.
A popular and prominent political figure among the Indian political firmament, she has often stood out in a crowd with her strikingly upright posture, a stance many attribute to her skill as a mass-people politician since her debut in politics.
The just concluded West Bengal polls has commenced her political sagacity. She is now set to dominate all-India based politics. With her own formidable and independent political experience and skill, she is set to national politics of India.
She could genuinely relate to people who were suffering, without regarding to gender, age or socioeconomic class; it has given her confidence. While the gesture was purely symbolic, it also has a positive effect on the veterans, giving them a sense of hope about her policies.
As part of this general role, she undertakes frequent trips around West Bengal, to even the most remote regions, where she comes to inspect various new people’s welfare-oriented programes – usually without announcement so programe supervisors cannot suddenly disguise problems. Sometimes the issues she feels needed addressing, change or improvement hinged on small matters; other times, she detected a consensus among the recipients of the programmes.
While she might be said to have exemplified her own unique style of simple politics, she is following popular looks of her era, rather than seeking to popularize her own stylus for others.
It sounds well when prominent journalist and celebrated columnist Syed Badrul Ahasan has written, “Her politics has always been that of a street fighter.” Or “Her politics worked. Today, the Left stands decimated; the Congress is comatose; and the BJP licks its wounds.” Or “She reached out to all Bengalis, Hindu and Muslim, informing them that the heritage of Bengal — underscored by secularism, by a collective adherence to its poetry and its multifarious religious manifestations — was under assault from the votaries of Hindu nationalism and needed to be saved.”
The populous Indian state of West Bengal has emerged as a key battleground for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party, which is looking to extend its national domination and dislodge one of Modi’s sharpest critics.
To win power in the eastern state, where a month-long election began, Modi’s right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had deployed its formidable election machinery, backed by deep pockets.
The party brass including Modi and his powerful home minister Amit Shah – has also been relentlessly campaigning, flanked by local leaders poached from the Trinamool Congress (TMC), which has ruled the state since 2011 and is headed by firebrand Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
The BJP currently controls a dozen of the country’s 28 states, with alliance partners in several others. But it has never won power in West Bengal, whose 90 million people make it the fourth most populous state.
“A victory in Bengal would mean that they are closer to their one-nation, one-party ambition,” said political analyst Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
Winning states is key to controlling the upper house of the federal parliament whose members are elected by state assemblies. The BJP already has a huge majority in the lower house of parliament and will be in a better position to enact legislation through parliament, analysts say.
Mamata’s victory in West Bengal could also weaken political opposition against the Modi government’s recent moves, including a months-long farmers agitation over new farm laws, Mukhopadhyay said.
Modi’s politics and policies through the pandemic has thus still a long way to go in West Bengal, though the party has made substantial inroads in the state, notching up 77 seats from the mere three it could win in the last elections held in 2016.
The BJP also faced a formidable opponent in Banerjee, the incumbent chief minister who campaigned from a wheel-chair after a recent accident.
“Do not look at individual candidates, cast your vote for me,” Banerjee says in her public rallies. Her centrist party came to power when it ousted the Communists who had ruled the state for more than 30 years.
A TMC lawmaker, Mahua Moitra, said that while the party had only a tenth of the BJP’s resources it would rely on its track record and grassroots organisation to retain power.
“The development work on the ground for the last 10 years is undeniable,” Moitra said.
At the BJP headquarters in the heart of West Bengal’s capital Kolkata, groups of upbeat party members sat in powwows every day during the elections, but ultimately was outperformed by the TMC.
Alok Haldar, a BJP member, said low-level corruption during the TMC’s long years in power had helped his party make inroads. “Voters will teach them a lesson,” he said. But Mahua Moitra, referring to allegations of graft made by critics against the TMC, said that there had been “great efforts” to clean up the party at the grassroots level. “There is no doubt in my mind, at all, that we are coming back,” she said. And that her prediction came true.
Banerjee is now India’s only woman chief minister.
Despite the defeat, Modi’s BJP made substantial gains, making it the main opposition party as its tally in the state legislature went to nearly 80 seats from just three seats won in 2016.
Modi, his colleagues and regional politicians campaigned aggressively in five state elections despite the coronavirus pandemic. The results were seen as a test of the impact the pandemic’s second wave was not having on support for him and his right-wing BJP.
Banerjee, a sharp critic of Modi, largely conducted a one-woman campaign to retain power by leading scores of public rallies.
“It is a stupendous performance by Mamata Banerjee because Modi was determined to win Bengal, but it’s clear that his entire political machinery and strategy was unable to defeat her,” said Diptendu Bhaskar, a political analyst in Kolkata, West Bengal’s capital.
The victory also puts the 66-year-old Trinamool Congress chairperson at the forefront of national politics with all the leaders of Opposition parties congratulating her for the massive win.
Mamata Banerjee, the Iron Lady conquered West Bengal fighting BJP’s election war machine single-handedly. She will be the central face of opposition in 2024 after the Bengal Assembly elections won in 2021.
The author is an independent political analyst, based in Dhaka, Bangladesh.
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