TMC banks on Adhikari in stronghold

As the gruelling month-long election campaign in West Bengal wound down on Tuesday, the Trinamool Congress (TMC) candidate in Nandigram, Subhendu Adhikari, just about beat the Election Commission’s deadline of 6 pm to make his final pitch to voters.

Speaking in Nandigram town, he was ironically flanked by a statue of BJP ideologue Shyamaprasad Mookerjee on one side and a temple on the other. His parting words to the crowd, who along with voters in 15 other seats in East Medinipur and nine in Cooch Behar will cast their ballot on
May 5, was an appeal for a larger margin of victory for TMC than in 2011. Such in Adhikari’s presence in Nandigram, where 42 people were killed in 2007 in land acquisition protests during the Left Front’s tenure, that the electoral outcome there does not seem to be in any doubt.

But it is in the rest of East Medinipur district, where TMC won all 16 seats in 2011 and increased its margin in 2014, that Adhikari holds the key to his party’s fortunes. Adhikari, sitting MP from Tamluk in the district who has also figured in the Narada sting, is a member of a unique political dynasty in West Bengal. His father Sisir Adhikari was a two-time MP from Contai and a minister in the UPA II government; his brother Dibyendu is a sitting MLA from Dakshin Kathi who is again contesting on a TMC ticket; and another brother Soumendu is the chairman of the Kanthi
municipality. It is, however, Subhendu who is virtually running the TMC campaign in the district, which was once a Left fortress but is now a TMC stronghold.

A veteran political activist of the district associated with the anti-land acquisition movement in Nandigram, who is now with the SUCI, believes that TMC could win most of the seats on offer in West Medinipur albeit with a slimmer margin of victory. According to him, Adhikari’s
personal popularity, the TMC’s organisatonal strength and the development work done by the government would stand TMC in good stead. Voters in Nandigram like Tarun Mondal point to the roads, the water supply and an under-construction state hospital as visible markers of the work done by TMC. Memories of the CPM’s atrocities are also fresh in the mind of Mondal, whose wife was injured during the 2007 violence.

The SUCI activist believes that the Narada sting or the Sarada scam has not had much of an impact in East Medinipur. His opinion is backed by Salim, a resident of Nandakumar, who says, “Je korbe, shey khaabe (He who works will also be on the take).” The SUCI activist, however,
cautions that the sudden show of wealth by the district’s TMC leaders has become a talking point. He mentions TMC politicians like Sheikh Sufiyan who is the deputy chairman of the East Medinipur zilla parishad.

Sufiyan owns a three-storey house in Nandigram which is difficult to miss. The house is painted in bright colours and has a replica of a ship on the roof. Sufiyan, however, dismisses accusations of being on the take. He says that he owns four fishing trawlers and his three brothers own big stores as well as run contractor businesses. What is left unsaid is the nexus between TMC’s leaders and the state’s ‘syndicate’ raj. Sufiyan is also confident that the Muslim vote, which comprises roughly a quarter of East Medinipur’s electorate, is with TMC.

The lack of jobs could hurt TMC. There are several like Mondal whose two sons have been forced to go to Ahmedabad and Mumbai in search of work. Opposition leaders believe that TMC could lose a few seats in East Medinipur. Sabuj Mondal of the Congress lists at least six seats, including Moyna, Egra and Bhagabanpur, where the Left-Congress combine could win.

The strict vigilance by the EC and security forces could make a difference too. This was evident from chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s speeches in the district on Sunday where she attacked the police and warned of the consequences they would face if she was voted back to power.

(The writer is with the National University of Singapore.)