Trinamool Congress worker waves the party flag as initial trends show the victory of the party in the Lok Sabha election, in Birbhum on June 04.
| Photo Credit: ANI
Despite some scepticism about fielding the old guard in the Lok Sabha election, veteran leaders of the Trinamool Congress, who were given tickets by the party won with relative ease. Trinamool’s Sudipta Banerjee, a veteran politician and a nine-term MP, won for the tenth time from Kolkata Uttar Lok Sabha with a margin of 92,000 votes. Similarly, Sougata Roy won from Dum Dum, Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar from Basarat, and Mala Roy won from Kolkata Dakshin without the Opposition parties putting up much of a fight.
However, the Trinamool leadership did not put all its weight behind veterans and fielded a number of political greenhorns who made political heavyweights bite the dust. For instance, Jagadish Chandra Basunia, a school teacher, defeated former Union Minister of State Nisith Pramanik from Cooch Behar, and actress Rachana Banerjee defeated Bharatiya Janata Party leader and former MP Locket Chatterjee from Hooghly. Two cricketers Yusuf Pathan and Kirti Azad who are not well versed in Bengali defeated big names in West Bengal politics – Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury at Baharampur and BJP’s Dilip Ghosh from Bardhaman-Durgapur respectively.
If Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had her say in nominating the veterans, the newcomers were endorsed by Trinamool general secretary Abhishek Banerjee. The Trinamool winning 29 of 42 seats and registering a vote share of 45.76% is an endorsement of the people’s faith in Mamata Banerjee, and it also puts a stamp of approval on the political acumen of Abhishek Banerjee.
Addressing a press conference on June 4, hours after the trends of the Lok Sabha results became public, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee thanked I-PAC for extending support to her party.
“I am thanking all the Trinamool grassroots and the entire team of I-PAC,” Ms. Banerjee said. She also added that poll strategist Prashant Kishor was not with I-PAC and it was a new team that worked with her party.
During the run-up to the Lok Sabha election, the I-PAC team not only designed campaign strategies for Trinamool candidates but also played a key role in reaching out to different categories of voters, including Scheduled Tribe and OBC candidates and women. The representatives of I-PAC reached out to beneficiaries of several schemes of the West Bengal government, particularly women, and convinced them to vote for the State’s ruling party.
While the I-PAC was also behind the Trinamool’s campaign in the 2021 Assembly election where the State’s ruling party defeated BJP, this was the first time that the Chief Minister was seen publicly thanking the team of political consultants.
Women voters and women MPs
Another key outcome of the elections is the high number of women MPs that have been elected on a Trinamool ticket. Eleven of 29 MPs of the Trinamool are women, comprising 38% of all the MPs of the Trinamool.
The list of women MPs include Mahua Moitra who defended Krishnanagar Lok Sabha seat by 56,000 votes and Shatabadi Roy who won from Birbhum for the fourth consecutive term by a margin of 1.97 lakh votes. The other sitting women MPs of Trinamool include Sajda Ahmed from Uluberia, Mala Roy from Kolkata Dakshin, Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar from Barasat, and Protima Mondal from Joynanagr.
The first time women MPs of Trinamool include Rachana Banerjee who won from Hooghly, former actor turned politician Sayoni Ghosh from Jadavpur and Mitali Bag, a former anganwadi worker, from Arambagh among others.
Political observers and now even BJP leaders are admitting that despite a high pitched campaign, the BJP and other Opposition parties could not sway women voters. Ms. Banerjee’s personal charisma as well as the cash incentive schemes like Lakshmir Bhandar have been able to blunt the allegations of corruption for the second consecutive time in this election after the 2021 Assembly election.