Tag: BJP

By PTI
KOLKATA: With West Bengal politics witnessing a class-to-caste paradigm shift, the TMC and BJP are engaged in a bitter fight to woo Dalit communities, a deciding factor in the ongoing assembly elections.

Dalits, comprising 23.5 per cent of the state’s electorate and 25-30 per cent of its population, can influence results in around 100-110 seats in the 294-member assembly, most of which will go to polls in the next four phases.

In a state where the electoral discourse has been dominated by class struggle during the 34 years of Left Front rule, both the TMC and BJP are now leaving no stone unturned to secure the votes of Dalits and other backward communities.

Rajbongshis, living in Cooch Behar and other border districts in north Bengal, and Matuas, refugees from erstwhile East Pakistan and their descendants influential in 30-40 seats in south Bengal, are the two largest Dalit communities in the state whom the TMC and BJP are fighting to woo.

Both the BJP and the TMC are championing the rights of Dalits and other backward communities.

The state has 68 seats reserved for Scheduled Castes (SCs) and 16 for Scheduled Tribes (STs).

Both the parties have promised to include communities like Mahishya, Teli, Tamul and Saha in the OBC list as per the Mandal Commission recommendations if voted to power.

While the TMC has nominated 79 Dalit candidates in the polls, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had visited a renowned temple in Bangladesh’s Orakandi, the birthplace of Matua spiritual guru Harichand Thakur.

A TMC candidate allegedly likening Dalits with beggars has also emerged as a key election issue.

The BJP had won a majority of the state’s reserved seats in the 2019 Lok Sabha election, prompting the TMC to go on a course correction drive and regularise all the refugee colonies and give them land rights, besides exploiting the delay and confusion over the implementation of CAA.

While the TMC had won 50 of the reserved seats in the 2016 assembly elections, the BJP has made deep inroads into the SC-dominated areas, leading in 46 seats, including 34 in Matua-dominated areas, in the Lok Sabha elections.

“The BJP has given a voice to the backward communities by speaking about their core aspirations. SCs will be a deciding factor in this election and will vote hands down for us,” state BJP chief Dilip Ghosh said.

Echoing him that caste will play an important role in the polls, senior TMC leader Sougata Roy, however, dismissed the BJP’s claim that it is fighting for Dalit rights.

“The rise in crime against Dalits in BJP-ruled states shows that the saffron party is least bothered about them. In Bengal, on the other hand, it is misleading the Dalits,” he said.

The CPI(M) blamed both the TMC and the BJP for taking West Bengal’s political discourse to a “new low” through divisive politics.

Since Independence, elections in West Bengal, which boasts of being the cradle of the Indian renaissance, have always being fought along ideological lines, with religion and caste-based politics taking a back seat.

The Left Front, which dominated the state’s political space for decades, discouraged caste politics, while SCs and STs, beneficiaries of the land reforms implemented by it, were its committed supporters.

“Caste politics was never into play in West Bengal. The state had never witnessed such divisive politics as is the practice now,” Sugata Bose, noted historian and Harvard University professor, told PTI.

“Realising that only communal polarisation won’t help, every party is seeking to woo Dalits, who they feel are key to win elections,” Bose said.

Political analysts said that TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee had first thought of consolidating the votes of Dalits, apart from religious minorities, in TMC’s favour.

She had nominated members of the Matua Thakurbari, the seat of power of the Matuas, as TMC candidates in the 2011 elections, paving way for her victory.

The TMC government had formed various ethnic development boards across the state, which helped the party perform well in the 2014 Lok Sabha and 2016 assembly elections.

However, the BJP’s promise to implement the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), the RSS’s history of work among smaller Dalit communities like Bauris and Bagdis and the party’s strategy to give nominations to Matua Thakurbari members also paid off in its favour.

Besides, the BJP also accuses the TMC of “minority appeasement” and favouring illegal immigrants over refugees, who had fled religious persecution in Bangladesh.

Political analyst Suman Bhattacharya said that Dalits and minorities, despite being dominant by their numbers, were never key players in West Bengal politics as upper caste Hindus always dominated the political space.

“The Left Front did not encourage identity politics. But Mamata Banerjee had first shown the road and now the BJP is treading it,” he said.

Express News Service
MALDA: In a nondescript village in Malda district’s Habibpur, four Tata Ace vehicles (locally known as Chhota Hathi), each carrying four to six giant loudspeakers, are roaming the area non-stop and playing a song — Pishi ebar tumi jao, ashche BJP (Aunty you leave, BJP is coming to power).

This never-seen-before style of campaigning begins sharp at 8 am every morning and continues till the time the locals go home for an early dinner and call it a day.

The vehicles, with lotus everywhere and photos of the BJP candidate in this Assembly constituency, often cross paths with those of their rivals, who are equally armed with loudspeakers blaring a 22-second piece — jora phuler bhangiye neta, sohoj noyko vote e jeta/bondhu ebar khela hobe (winning elections with TMC turncoats won’t happen mate, the game is on).

Bengal has witnessed several high-voltage elections, but the style of campaigning has never been such noisy, ignoring the decibel restrictions prescribed by the pollution control board.

“These vehicles even venture into the remote pockets. Throughout the day, we hear these songs. Both parties are trying to inject their own narratives into the mind of voters. If you pass by a roadside tea stall, you will see youngsters humming these lines,’’ says Swapan Debnath, a local grocery shop owner.

A BJP leader in Malda said that in Habibpur itself, at least 50 vehicles are roaming around.

“For this, we don’t need to engage manpower. One person is driving and songs stored in pen-drives are being played. But yes, you need to spend a lot for this kind of poll campaigning,” he says.

The leader said each driver is given Rs 500 per day other than the fuel charge. This practice is followed in almost all the constituencies in North Dinajpur, South Dinajpur, Alipurduar and Jalpaiguri districts.

The high-decibel campaign in north Bengal’s rural region, comprising six districts from Cooch Behar to Malda, is a part of the high-intensity psychological warfare the two rivals have engaged in.

The saffron camp is desperately trying to create a perception that it has nearly captured power. TMC and its election strategist Prashant Kishore’s team are not lagging behind either.

While BJP and TMC are following high-octane, technology-aided methods to influence voters at the grassroots, the Left Front-Congress-Indian Secular Force (ISF) alliance seems to be preferring the traditional way of reaching out to people.

The alliance is giving importance to door-to-door campaigning.

“We are holding street-corner meetings in remote areas and raising issues the common man can relate to. We are not giving any specific promises like ‘Sonar Bangla’ or providing door-step ration,’’ said Ali Imran Ramz, the Left candidate in North Dinajpur’s Chakulia constituency. He was referring to the poll promises made by BJP and TMC, respectively.

In contrast to the BJP and the TMC campaign fight that primarily takes swipe at each other, the alliance is highlighting the issues of joblessness, anarchy in the field of education, poor healthcare system and the stalled industrialisation in the state.

The psychological war between the BJP and the TMC to create perception seems to have an impact on floating voters in the rural pockets of northern West Bengal. 

In Malda’s Ratua village, Zulfiquar Ali, a 28-year-old jobless youth who helps his father in farming, usually refrains from politics and other related issues.

“But this time, I am keeping a tab on the happening and campaigns more closely than ever. It is an unprecedented election. Those who quite frankly expressed their political view even a couple of months ago have now gone tightlipped. Both sides are bluffing and both sides are getting their bluffs called out,’’ Ali said. “One of the results of this high-decibel propaganda war of exposing and exaggerating the weakness in the rival camp is that the real issues are getting buried.”     

The jobless villager’s view is seconded by a teacher of a girls’ high school in Malda town.

“The propaganda war is intense. It seems either both the BJP and the TMC are on the same ground because supporters are both camps stand clueless about the outcome. What I found is interesting that a section of TMC supporters think the party may not return to power, while supporters of BJP think Mamata is likely to sail through,’’ said the teacher who refused to be named.    

The psychological war of the main opposition and the ruling party reached its peak after Nandigram went to polls on April 1.

Mamata contested in the high-profile seat against her once trusted lieutenant Suvendu Adhikari.

Once the election in Nandigram was over, the BJP’s high command, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah started trying to create an impression that Mamata would lose to Adhikari by a big margin.