By coasting to a comfortable victory against BJP’s Priyanka Tibrewal from Bhabanipur in South Kolkata, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee today set to rest all speculation regarding her political future. In fact, Mamata won by nearly 59,000 votes against her rival who managed to secure 25,000 votes from the constituency considered to be mini-India given that it has nearly 40 percent of the electorate which is non-Bengali and from other states. The BJP had been predicting that she would meet the same fate here as she did in Nandigram where she lost to Suvendu Adhikari by a narrow margin in a fiercely contested battle, some months ago. Mamata has represented this seat on two previous occasions as well when in 2016, she had defeated Deepa Das Munshi of the Congress by 25.301 votes and in 2011, Nandini Mukherjee of the CPI(M) by over 54,000 votes. The three-time Chief Minister is now set to also play a national role and may be the pivot around whom all opposition parties could forge a broad front against the BJP in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
However, much would depend on the Assembly polls outcome of 2022 and if the BJP loses control of Uttar Pradesh, the country’s most populous state, its dominance over national politics would seem to diminish. The BJP continues to be very confident about its chances there and is heavily banking on the Ram Mandir issue to help it sail through despite a stiff challenge that is likely to come from the Samajwadi Party led by Akhilesh Yadav. Attempts are already on to finalise a blue print for the Opposition coalition and veteran leader, Sharad Pawar has taken the initiative by talking to leaders of various parties. The problem that is arising is that the Congress by virtue of being the largest Opposition party is not willing to yield its dominating position and an Opposition challenge without the Congress being a part of the coalition is unthinkable at this stage.
The second issue is that as long as Sonia Gandhi was at the helm of affairs of the grand old party, there was not much difficulty for others to accept her leadership. The same would not hold if Rahul or his sister Priyanka were to be made presidents of the party. Therefore, in the light of the developing situation, the dissident Congress leaders known as G-23 are also flexing their muscles. The dilemma before the Congress and its followers is that unless the Gandhis decide themselves to step aside and allow someone else to takeover the leadership, it would be very difficult to replace them. There are leaders of considerable experience within the Congress ranks such Kamal Nath, Bhupinder Singh Hooda and Ashok Gehlot who can be acceptable to the possible allies but this cannot happen in a very short span. Mamata is respected by Congress leaders, past and present and she is perceived to be both a fighter and someone who leads from the front. Lately, she has ruffled some feathers in the Congress by admitting two prominent faces from that party, Sushmita Dev and former Goa CM, Luizinho Faleiro. Thus, her relations with the top leadership may have been affected even though Sonia Gandhi had received her affectionately when she had visited the national capital in August. Mamata shall surely be playing an important role as and when the Opposition unity takes place and maybe the best person to lead it as well.