With political dynamics of an evolved order, the eastern Indian state of West Bengal moves into its 17th Assembly election. Nationalism and secularism being the mostly focussed themes of this election, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) who is strongly entrenched at the Centre has unleashed all its resources to apparently train it’s electoral guns on Bengal’s politically seasoned ruling party, Trinamool Congress (TMC) who ousted the strong administration of the 34 years deeply rooted Left Front (LF) government from the State, in a bid to wean away incumbancy from the TMC. The Left Front who had been dormant the last few years following their electoral debacle in 2011 unexpectedly losing to the TMC, has reemerged in this election chalking out newer equations of fielding youthful candidates, striking alignment with their long back staunch rival, Congress and roping in a freshly formed political outfit, Indian Secular Front (ISF). In the backdrop of this political volatility in the State, The Edition spoke to people across domains in India and abroad to hear their Voices on this high voltage Bengal polls. Here is the 1st part :
Former editor with the Oxford University Press and Macmillan India limited. Publishing consultant, Quiz Master and an avid Debater. Can be reached at gems.prantikbose@gmail.com
Charles Dickens in his Tale of Two Cities wrote, “It is the best of times and it is the worst of times”. Perhaps this aptly defines the state of the pre-election mood of West Bengal as it goes to the 17th Assembly polls in 2021.
It is almost after 40 years that the electorate will get a chance to install a government of the same political party which is also firmly entrenched at the Centre and it is also true that never had the religious divide been so stark and naked in an Assembly poll in West Bengal.
It is a pity that religion today hangs like a Damocle’s Sword in a state which has given birth to stalwarts like Rabindranath Tagore, Swami Vivekananda, Raja Ram Mohun Roy, Iswar Chandra Vidyasagar and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. Religion has degenerated into a perverse concept. What we need is a secular answer and a leader who would be successful to create a divorce between religion and politics with his/her elan and poise.
Bengal, never had a seamless flow of resources and opportunities after the Left Front came to power in 1977. Rhetoric, more than realism has been the driving force of the politicians who has furthered their own interests sacrificing the development of the state at large.
The brutal suppression of the Naxalite movement by the then Chief Minister Siddhartha Sankar Roy is having a ripple effect today. There is a total absence of ‘intellect’ and a developmental vision in the candidates today. The filling of the political space with silver screen populism speaks volume of the vacuum that Bengal today has plunged in. There is no leader to match the vision of Dr Bidhan Roy. Let us not mention that the seat of the Mayor was once occupied by Netaji Subhas Bose.
Have we matured as an electorate as we go to vote for the 17th Assembly elections? Is a resurrection possible without education and vision? Perhaps not.
What Bengal needs today is a secular answer. Do we really have a leader to pull us out of this dungeon darkness? 2nd May will give us the answer to this million dollar question.
Senior Lecturer – Global Development Politics, University of York, UK. Can be reached at indrajit.roy@york.ac.uk
The Battle for Bengal has implications not only for India but the broader region. Irrespective of which party wins, the divisive electoral campaign will strain Hindu-Muslim relations for years to come. If the BJP wins, and begins implementing the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) as it has promised, the State can witness large-scale turmoil owing to the religious filter of the legislation. Even if the BJP loses, the political narrative in the State would have been shot through with Hindu-Muslim division, which will allow the party to stoke flames of conflict for several years.
As religious tensions simmer in the border State, fanned by the spectre of the CAA, India’s largely friendly relations with Bangladesh can be expected to take a hit. As is well-known, the CAA offers a safety net for Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, Parsees, Sikhs and Christians from neighbouring Muslim-majority Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh. Muslims are omitted from this safety net. The religious filter of the CAA is likely to exacerbate tensions between the two communities and destabilise relations between India and Bangladesh.
Despite Home Minister Amit Shah’s assurance that the CAA will not target Indian Muslims and will only be used to identify “illegal infiltrators”, the onus of proving citizenship rests on the individuals. Furthermore, local bureaucrats enjoy enormous discretion in approving and verifying citizenship claims, leading to anxieties that West Bengal’s Muslims will bear a disproportionate brunt while proving their citizenship. Many such individuals will likely to be dubbed Bangladeshi nationals who the government may attempt to “deport” to that country. There are few reasons to expect Bangladesh to accept such individuals as its own citizens, almost certainly fuelling suspicion.
Inter-communal tension appears inevitable in West Bengal for the foreseeable future. A BJP victory will most certainly aggregate it. A TMC win will, at best, delay it, but in unlikely to eliminate it. Relations with Bangladesh will suffer as domestic Hindu-Muslim relations spill over into international fora, although a TMC win may allow India to pursue a dual-track diplomacy that softens hard edges.
Vice President, Accenture and former Associate Director, Cognizant. A technology leader, speaker and author of bestselling fiction and non-fiction in English and Bengali. Can be reached at mukherjee.sourabh74@gmail.com
It is the time for Assembly Elections in West Bengal and public meetings, processions and heated debates on television are in full swing. As an apolitical citizen of the State who is concerned with, and only with, the well-being of its people, I have a take that is very different from the more popular opinions on air.
In 2021, still recovering from the perils of a global pandemic that has taken away lives and jobs, this election will be a game-changer for the future of this state. Like everywhere else in the world, there is an imminent need to leverage technology for the sustenance of human life in these adverse conditions.
The population needs to be categorized into two primary groups – the enablers and the beneficiaries. The enablers are those who, gifted with knowledge in the areas of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM), will leverage technologies like the Internet of Things and Artificial Intelligence to develop services, facilities and opportunities for the beneficiaries. How can we leverage technology to ensure that civic services are rendered without disruptions? How can we ensure that food, water and basic amenities are available in the furthest corners of the state? How can education progress uninterrupted? How can people be quickly trained for ‘contactless’ virtual ways of life and work? How can we benefit from modern farming practices without jeopardizing the environment? With time, more and more citizens should progress from the ‘beneficiary’ bucket to the ‘enabler’ bucket.
Remember, this is a problem that cannot be solved by doling out cash to the beneficiaries, unless and until we put in place the right academic, industrial and technological infrastructure to make this plan work. This needs leadership drive and execution down to the Block and Ward levels. If this approach, or at least a semblance of this, is beginning to work in different parts of the world, that are less resourceful than us, then why not here? This should be the priority of whoever comes to power. It should be only about informed, capable, and astute governance – and nothing else.
On the contrary, I see hours of debates on religious affiliations, on personal attacks and slandering, on how our leaders look and what they choose to wear, on meme fests in our mobile phones. The election seems to be all about winning seats, and therefore, we see a plethora of candidates from the world of entertainment (I do not question their popularity as entertainers) most of whom have never formulated policy, have never been in a constructive political debate, have no administrative experience. We are way too bothered about who is changing parties, and who is from the State or otherwise. How will any of these things matter, as long as, whoever comes to power, has the astuteness and the vision to drive the development agenda of the state, enabled by rapid advances in technology and science, cutting through bureaucratic hurdles and by taking everyone along in the journey, by making everyone wake up to the insignificance of caste, creed and religion in this battle for survival that we face today (instead of exploiting the same for political gains).
I wonder if my dream will be fulfilled this May.
Trained in fine arts from Indian College of Arts, Rabindra Bharati University, Kolkata and by Shuvaprasanna at College of Visual Arts, Kolkata. Participated in exhibitions and art workshops in India, Germany and UK. Can be reached at dip25banerjee@gmail.com
Bureaucrat from the Indian Railway Services having served in various capacities throughout India. Presently posted at Centre for Railway Information Systems (CRIS) as Chief Manager. Can be reached at 1024sonu@gmail.com
The 2021 election for 294 seats of the West Bengal Assembly present an intense drama of conflicting ideologies and personalities, opportunistically shifting loyalties, promises and counter- promises. While Mamata Banerjee, the incumbent Chief Minister, fiercely guards the fortress of Kolkata with her charisma and regionalism, BJP and its allies led by Dilip Ghosh, are trying to storm this citadel with their ammunition of nationalism, CAA and National Register of Citizens (NRC).
Amit Shah was quick to eat simple Bengali food on banana leaves at the house of a folk singer in Shantiniketan. Not to be outdone, Mamata made tea at a roadside stall at Nandigram, where she is pitted against her former ally and now rival from BJP, Shuvendu Adhikary.
Whereas Shuvendu with his band of legislators left the TMC to join rival BJP, Yashwant Sinha, ignored and neglected in the BJP, joined ranks with TMC.
Shah tried to rout Mamata with war cries of Jai Shri Ram and promise of citizenship to Dalit refugee Matuas under the CAA and National Register of Citizens (NRC).
Mamata matched Shah one to one by performing the Chandi Path, stating that Durga was superior to Ram, as Ram worshipped Durga himself. Prime Minister Narendra Modi promised jobs, growth and development while Didi released a new vision document of the TMC, promising bounties to the electorate if elected to power.
The Congress with its Communist allies is waiting to harness the votes left behind by both. Regional party like the JD(U) has also thrown its hat into the ring.
The BJP is tainted by allegations of stifling freedom of expression and dissent in the disguise of nationalism as in the Disha Ravi case. The TMC is no less tainted by corruption aka the Saradha scam. It looks like the pot calling the kettle black.
Every player is trying to encash upon the electoral opportunity for power. Once in power, accountability will come only in 2026. Till then whoever rules will enjoy the spoils of office!
Brigadier (Retd.), Indian Army, with expertise in Defence and Strategic Studies and Media Communications. Analyst on matters of Politics, Economy, Defence and General Administration. Can be reached at rtushir@rediffmail.com
The election in West Bengal, where the TMC Government under the leadership of Mamata Banerjee has been ruling the state for the past 10 years, is underway.
BJP has been trying to spread its wings across the country. They have already made inroads into India’s North Eastern States. They did this through large scale defections from the Congress and other parties. A bulk of the defecting leaders involved in criminal and financial fraud cases were as if purified and washed off their sins after they joined the BJP. Now, Bengal is BJP’s next target.
BJP started making preparations for the battleground to take stock of power in West Bengal some two years back. And here also it lured many TMC leaders, particularly those, bearing a taint of some kind.
In a way this may prove good for the TMC in this election as the garbage has been exported to BJP. The people of West Bengal love Mamata Didi and are likely to vote for her in large numbers. We expect Didi to romp home in case free and fair election takes place in the state.
The TMC supremo enjoys wide acceptance amongst Hindus, Muslims and several other communities in West Bengal. An honest leader leading a simple life, she cares for the poor and deprived.
While the present BJP leadership in West Bengal is burdened with a TMC defector tag.
Advocate at Supreme Court of India, Historian, Columnist, Public Speaker, Media Commentator, Political Analyst. Can be reached at adv.prathvi@gmail.com
In Bengal BJP has emerged as a serious threat to the Trinamool Congress in West Bengal, BJP is filing the vacuum created from the inconsistency of left parties so much so that it is now eyeing to unseat the ruling party in the Assembly election which set off today in the State.
In the 2016 election BJP managed to win only 3 legislative assembly seats. Thereafter, a massive change happened in the state which caught the attention of the political analysts across the country when BJP won 18 seats with 40% vote share in the 2019 Parliamentary Polls.
Since 2017, ‘Jai Shri Ram’, a slogan associated with the Ram Temple movement, has emerged as one of the loudest political slogans in the state, as all speeches in all events of the BJP and various organisations belonging to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) family end with ‘Jai Shri Ram’.
Nevertheless, creating polarisation of Hindus against the alleged appeasement of Muslims is one among three of BJP’s top agendas for Bengal. The two others being: polarising anti-incumbency against the state government in favour of BJP by using central agencies and Union ministries and mobilising the masses using the leadership resources of the national level.
The claim of BJP is getting momentum: The Mamata Banerjee government is welcoming the Rohingyas with open arms. They have spread all over West Bengal – the districts of Malda, Murshidabad, Uttar Dinajpur, North 24-Parganas and South 24-Parganas, Nadia and where not! This is a conspiracy to change West Bengal’s demography. And once the Muslims become the majority, the Hindus will be as much persecuted as the Hindus in Bangladesh.”
The BJP has been trying to rope in a popular Bengali face to counter Banerjee for some time now.
Many heavyweight leaders who left the TMC and joined the BJP — such as Dinesh Trivedi, Mukul Roy, Shubhendu Adhikari and Sovon Chatterjee — are also strenthening the backbone of the right wing party. Mithun Chakraborty meeting with RSS Chief and recently joining the BJP on 7th March in presence of PM Modi indicates that BJP is doing everything to woo bengali sentiment for this Assembly election.
To continue
Opinions expressed in this article are of the author’s and do not represent the policy of The Edition. The writers are solely responsible for any claim arising out of the contents of their articles.
#Tags: #WestBengalLegislativeAssemblyElection2021 #CAA #NRC #Secular
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