Come elections, hurling allegations and canards baseless or otherwise at political opponents is standard poll tactics. One of the principal leaders of BJP campaign in West Bengal rural polls, Subhendu Adhikari calling upon Left and Congress voters to support the saffron camp nominees as their leaders have allegedly closed ranks with Trinamool Congress at the Opposition meet held recently at Patna can be stated to be an instance of this tactic; yet the fact remains unknowingly he has touched upon a raw nerve of his outfit-organisational weakness.
There can be no quarrel over Adhikari’s outreach to voters of other outfits. The concept of “committed voters” no longer washes in an age of social media and live television coverage.
The significance of social media and live television coverage cannot be brushed aside as campaign played its role in triggering the removal of the 34-year long CPI-M led Left Front regime in the wake of incidents of mass violence at Nandigram and Singur which turned the tables in favour of Trinamool Congress. The much televised Narada sting operation which had the Trinamool on the back foot again underscored the importance of social media and live television coverage.
Patna Opposition meet being a widely covered event, no difficult task Adhikari looked Adhikari in the face as he alleged that the Left and Congress leaders have made peace with TMC while their supporters are left to face the ire of the lumpen elements of the state’s ruling dispensation. Dubbing the Congress and Left as Trinamool’s B-team, he asked their supporters to make better use of their votes by casting it for the BJP. . This appeal was meant more for the disgruntled workers of Congress and the CPI(M) who have to bear the brunt of TMC cadres wrath at local level.
A panchayat election campaign meeting is not quite the place to raise national politics issues. Small wonder, the crowd which had gathered to hear Adhikari speak at a rally in Heria in Midnapore (east) were taken by surprise at the allegation of Congress and Left colluding with Trinamool in national politics.
But Adhikari’s words were not for the ears of the BJP supporters attending his rally. His target audience were Left and Congress voters who had not come but was hearing his speech at their homes carried over by microphone from the rally site.
The Nandigram MLA who had defeated chief minister Mamata Banerjee in 2021 assembly elections by a wafer thin margin was seeking to sway the political allegiance of the voters exercising their franchise in favour of Left and Congress. The endeavour would fox even a close observer of West Bengal politics especially in the backdrop of a pre poll survey which puts TMC far ahead of BJP, Left and Congress in their prospects in the July 8 panchayat election. . This opinion poll survey carried out by the well known C Voter projects a big Trinamool win in 19 out of the 22 districts and only in three, BJP will give competition to the ruling party. The Congress-Left combination is projected to fare miserably like the last assembly polls.
Adhikari having carefully perused latest voting percentages is certainly not seeking the support of the “floating voters”, a term to describe those who make up their mind or change it on the way to the polling booth. He has the “committed voters” read diehard supporters in his sight.
Candidates with BJP nominations in 2016 Assembly election had 10.16 per cent votes cast in their favour. This percentage shot up to 38.1 percent in 2021 Assembly elections in which CPI-M’s vote share dropped from 19.75 per cent to 4.72 per cent while Congress’s vote share fell from 12.25 per cent to 2.94 per cent.
A number of central ministers coupled with back to back campaign tours in West Bengal by senior BJP leaders including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union home minister Amit Shah led to a spurt in the vote share of the saffron camp in 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Both state level CPI-M and Congress leaders have admitted that the BJP had cut into their respective vote banks.
Even as state BJP gloated over its electoral triumph, both the Left and the Congress started course correction. Agitations and mass contact programme by two Opposition outfits yielded an upswing in their vote share percentage in the civic election which followed the panchayat polls.
Vote share of four Left parties stood at 14 percent and Congress secured 5 percent and its addition since they contested in alliance stood at 19 per cent. On the other hand, the BJP had 12 percent votes in its bag.
In the by-elections between 2021 and 2023, the recovery trend of the outfits which are part of the Opposition outside the state Assembly continued. If Ballygunge by-election in 2022 which came into greater focus following a letter from actor Nasiruddin Shah seeking votes for the Left nominee, Saira Halim, the vote share of the Left stood at 30.06 per cent while the BJP vote share slipped to 12.83 per cent..However, this rise in CPI(M) votes in Ballygunge was not a general trend as in the Asansol Lok Sabha by election, the CPI(M) candidate performed miserably leading to massive victory by the Trinamool candidate.
Even if Trinamool’s nominee Babool Supriyo won in Ballygunge the ruling dispensation had to grudgingly admit in closed door meetings that the BJP had started to concede Opposition space to the Left. The trend continued at Sagardighi by-poll in Murshidabad where Left supported Congress nominee, Bairan Biswas won comfortably with 47.75 per cent votes with BJP candidate had 13.94 per cent votes. However soon after the lone elected Congress MLA defected to Trinamool Congress leaving the Congress with again zero seat in the state assembly.
Having carefully read between the lines, Adhikari’s call betrays a desperation for votes from the Left and Congress fold, a pointer to the ground below the saffron camp’s feet slipping in West Bengal. The political ground reality in the state markedly differs from several other parts of the country where the BJP is on an expansion mode while it is trying not too hopefully make up for the erosion in its support base in West Bengal. (IPA Service)
By Tirthankar Mitra