TMC battles late opposition surge today

KOLKATA: For Kolkata and its traditional heartland in the north, where voters pride themselves on their political consciousness, there will not be any dearth of issues to chew on as they head for the polling booth. It's the stretch between home and polling booth -and, at places, the polling booth itself -that present some sort of an enigma.

If recent history and behind-the-scene activity in the ruling camp are any indication, the city may be in line to witness a rerun of what it saw during the 2014 Lok Sabha and the 2015 civic polls: efforts to manipulate voting in some pockets, with some amount of violence and intimidation. On the other hand is the combined might of a suddenly active Election Commission, the central forces and the city police, who have promised to do whatever it takes to ensure voters can exercise their franchise.

The Bengal poll season enters its business stretch on Thursday, with seven north and central Kolkata constituencies and 55 more from Murshidabad, Nadia and Burdwan going to vote. The issues -a mix of local and pan-Bengal -are as disparate as the constituencies, with many of them being introduced in the plot towards the end of the fourth act of a five-act play, adding that touch of uncertainty to what initially looked like a one-horse race.

All the seven city constituencies that vote on Thursday are not more than five kilometres from the epicentre of the quake that Kolkata felt when the under-construction Vivekananda Road flyover crashed last month. One Trinamool seat, Jorasanko, seems to have borne the brunt of the crash, with fingers being pointed at the extended family of the local MLA, Smita Bakshi, but her party will be happy if the damage is limited to only her constituency.

The other major controversy, which may or may not impact the poll outcome but has definitely changed the demeanour of the Trinamool brass, is the Narada sting. The sight of several of its leaders taking cash has played out on tapes and it has suddenly made the super-confident party befuddled and its cocky leaders speak in disparate voices. Party chief Mamata Banerjee herself has been forced to take cognizance of the issue, saying she might have reconsidered several of these leaders' candidature had the sting come before their names were announced. One minister seen on tape, Firhad Hakim, feigned ignorance; another leader, Mukul Roy , "certified" no one had taken money for "personal gain". And the party itself, after living in denial for weeks, has now instituted an "internal probe" into the issue.

The last bit of discomfort has been added by the EC. Pilloried for failing to counter the alleged intimidation and violence on the first two days of polls, the EC turned super of polls, the EC turned s aggressive before the third day of Bengal polls, removing Kolkata Police commissioner Rajeev Kumar, censuring Trinamool's Birbhum chief Anubrata Mandal and then following it up with successive show-cause notices to the chief minister herself and the state's chief secretary Basudeb Banerjee, first for an alleged violation of the poll code of conduct and then for not following proper form in replying to that notice.

All this prompted a late outburst from the chief minister. "This election is a fight against terrorism sponsored by Delhi. It is at this very spot that we faced another kind of terror on February 22, 1994," she said, recalling a police firing that killed an opposition demonstrator and seeking to tie the CPM (in office during that incident) with the BJP (in office at the Centre now) in a common thread.

Both the Saradha scam (before the 2014 Lok Sabha elections) and the Narada sting (ahead of the polls now) became examples of the "conspiracy" against her party before Mamata reeled off hitherto unknown figures of other parties' poll funds.

"82.5% or Rs 2,200 crore of the election funds disclosed by Congress to the EC does not have a source. An unknown source accounts for 73% or Rs 2,100 crore of the BJP disclosure and CPM, which always projects a holier-than-thou image, has not been able to account for sources of 53.8% or Rs 868 crore. Should we investigate this?
Now I will also file chargesheets. Don't forget we still have 46 MPs in Parliament. I will take every bit of revenge," she said.

But for the Trinamool, the poll bandwagon heading south -and to its strongholds -will give some comfort. Murshidabad is the only district where it can be labelled as an underdog and most of the districts that go to poll on Thursday and later have a super-strong Trinamool organizations. There are now signs of some sort of revival for Left Front -the tie-up with the Congress coming as a morale booster.However, Murshidabad -where the arithmetic is loaded in favour of the Left-Congress alliance -could turn out to be its Achilles's heel, because of the bad chemistry between allies there.