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From Plassey to Panskura

There are people who have never heard of, say, Haldia, Murshidabad, or many other towns in West Bengal. But there are two places in the state that every schoolchild would recognise -- the first is Calcutta, and the second is Plassey. That last named, as we all know, was witness to a historic shift in the power structure of India.

I believe that very soon there will be another such slightly obscure town that shall hit the headlines -- Panskura. The effects of the Battle of Panskura will not be as far-reaching as those of Plassey, yet I believe that its ripples will be felt across India.

Panskura is the Lok Sabha constituency that was once represented by the late Geeta Mukherjee of the CPI. The by-election caused by her death is proving to be surprisingly tense for all the major contenders -- the CPI-M-led Left Front, the Congress and the Trinamul Congress-Bharatiya Janata Party alliance. Will Mamta Banerjee's proposed 'Mahajot' take off? How popular is the Jyoti Basu government given the bickering within the Left Front and the disadvantages caused by 23 years of incumbency? Finally, to what extent does Sonia Gandhi's word hold sway in her party?

The Lok Sabha polls of 1998 and 1999 proved that the two major contenders for power in West Bengal are the Left Front and the Trinamul Congress-Bharatiya Janata Party alliance. Nevertheless, the spotlight is on Subhankar Sarkar, the nominee handpicked by Sonia Gandhi. Nobody expects the poor man to win the contest -- it is widely anticipated that he will be a distant third -- but for all that he is the symbol of Sonia Gandhi's resistance to the 'Mahajot'.

This, as you may recall, was supposed to be a 'Grand Alliance' of all forces against the Left Front. (Strictly speaking, the target is the CPI-M; Mamta Banerjee made it clear that the smaller partners in the Left Front were welcome.) ABA Ghani Khan Chowdhury, president of the West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee, publicly endorsed the project, as did Somen Mitra and several other prominent Congressmen in the state. A part of the deal was supposed to be that all the parties concerned -- the Congress, the Trinamul Congress, and the Bharatiya Janata Party -- would put up a joint candidate at Panskura. And it was at this point that Sonia Gandhi stepped in...

Chowdhury and Mitra have reacted by declaring a Non-Cooperation Movement of their own. They cannot deny the party president's right to offer a Lok Sabha ticket to whom she chooses, but there are other ways of making their attitude clear. So the Pradesh Congress Committee was absent when Sarkar filed his papers, and Mitra has announced that he will not campaign for Sarkar.

So much for the partners in the proposed 'Mahajot', what is at stake for the Left Front? The candidate for the seat is Gurudas Dasgupta of the CPI. A few weeks ago the CPI-M refused to renominate him to the Rajya Sabha, though he was one of the most articulate speakers on the Opposition benches. This led to an angry CPI pulling out its ministers from the Jyoti Basu administration (they have since returned to work.) In effect, the CPI is asking Big Brother CPI-M to prove its loyalty to the Left Front by nominating Gurudas Dasgupta to his late party colleague's constituency.

Who will win this fascinating race? On paper at any rate, a three-way race should see Dasgupta in the Lok Sabha. However, I do know who shall lose -- Sonia Gandhi. I also believe that the winner, at least in the long term, shall be Mamta Banerjee.

If the Trinamul Congress candidate wins, Mamta Banerjee shall have reinforced her status as the chief bulwark against the Left Front and the fact that she can draw on Congress votes no matter what Sonia Gandhi says or does. But if the Trinamul Congress nominee loses it will further embitter Congressmen, convincing them that the only way to stop the Left Front juggernaut is to make a reality of the 'Mahajot'.

Sonia Gandhi has limited options in West Bengal. She cannot convince her partymen that the Congress can return to power on its own in the state. If the party is sincere about getting back to the seat of government in Writers' Building, it can only be done in alliance with the Trinamul Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party. Which option do you think sounds more captivating to Congressmen -- continued irrelevance or a genuine shot at power?

T V R Shenoy