Mamata is making the Bengal battle personal

FOUR states and one union territory will elect their new Assemblies this month, but one of them dominates the headlines: West Bengal. It isn't as if elections to Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Assam or Puducherry are done deals, for there are strong opposition parties making them a real contest. But West Bengal is dominating the news cycle for two reasons: one, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) believes it has a chance this time. But, more importantly, it is making news because of the way in which Mamata Banerjee, who has ruled the state since 2011, is making the contest intensely personal.Before we get to the personal bit, here is why the BJP thinks its time has come. Unlike the last time, when it behaved like a Hindi-belt party and presumed that it would romp home with ‘Jai Shri Ram’ as a slogan, it is now taking care to ensure that Bengali pride is not hurt for any reason.Also, unlike 2021, when it left its workers to be targeted by goons affiliated to the party that won, this time the BJP is taking no chances. Home Minister Amit Shah is planning to stay in Bengal for 15 days before the voting days, April 23 and 29.Mamata's problem is that she always makes things personal, whether it was before she became Chief Minister or after. Singur, where she got the Tata car project thrown out, was personal even though Bengal was getting its first major investment in a long, long time.Ditto for Nandigram, where the ruling Left Front gathered courage to allow a business group to set up a chemical complex. Mamata ensured that it never happened. When Suvendu Adhikari, a former Trinamool associate who was part of the Nandigram protests, joined the BJP and chose to contest from Nandigram, Mamata made it personal and vowed to defeat him in that constituency, even though she had safer options elsewhere. She lost by a whisker, but she hasn't forgotten that defeat.Now, suddenly, everybody who stands in her way is the enemy. It does not matter if it is the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) and the constitutional body he heads, or even the Supreme Court (SC). Her party launched a (now infructuous) move to impeach CEC Gyanesh Kumar.And, when the issue of Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls came up for hearing in the SC, she made it personal by choosing to don her lawyer robes to argue against the SIR when she already had high-impact lawyers fighting her case.And when the SC ordered judicial officers to decide on the final voter lists based on documents sought by the Election Commission (EC), her police force did little to prevent a mob in Malda from intimidating some of these officers and holding them captive for a while. She claimed that the police were now under the EC and her party had nothing to do with it. Maybe so.But she should worry if the law-and-order machinery she once headed as CM is now incapable of or unwilling to do its job. It speaks louder than words on what is wrong with her state — a state run as a personal fief, where administrative loyalties to politicians are stronger than a commitment to the law. Not that the police and administration in other states are fully free from political allegiance, but in West Bengal, the rot has clearly set in deeper.Apart from making things personal, Mamata's aggressive behaviour is a sign that she too senses that the voter may want a change this time.This may be one reason why she has made open threats to state officials who may only be doing the jobs assigned by the EC.In February, the Election Commission filed an affidavit in the SC, alleging that state officials were reluctant to conduct the SIR as they were facing violence, intimidation and obstruction by the state machinery in doing their duty. In a 91-page affidavit, the EC quoted excerpts from some of her speeches which explicitly urged the public to take the law into their own hands.This is not to suggest that Mamata will lose, for she has done some good work, especially in improving women's welfare. But the state has not progressed much in terms of other economic indicators. As Shamika Ravi, a member of the Economic Advisory Council of the PM, asked on X: "What is holding West Bengal back? While the rest of India has enjoyed real growth in consumption levels over the last decade, WB has experienced near stagnation, especially in urban areas. In fact, the top 20 percent of urban WB population has seen a decline in their real consumption."In terms of per capita GSDP (gross state domestic product), West Bengal has seen a steady slide since Independence, from being number three in the 1960s to number 23 or 24 now.Two reasons could be behind this decline: an anti-business attitude that can be traced to the Communists who came to power in 1977. They ruled for 34 years, followed by Mamata Banerjee, who also managed to spook investors.Then there is the heavy influx of illegal immigrants, who bloat the population and strain the state's resources. According to a research study by Vidhu Shekar, former faculty member of the SP Jain Institute of Management & Research, and Milan Kumar, faculty member of IIM-Calcutta, West Bengal's surge in voters is not commensurate to its actual demographic growth. They estimate that in 2024, the state's voter list contained 1.04 crore names that do not appear to align with population data as indicated in the state's births, deaths and migration numbers.This explains why there is so much heartburn over the SIR, which is trying to weed out voters who may not be citizens, or may otherwise be ineligible to vote in West Bengal.None of this implies that Mamata Banerjee is going to lose the elections underway, or that the deletions in the voter lists will have a material impact all over the state. It may impact some pockets at best, and even these may not materially impact the voting trends. What Mamata's actions and body language indicate is that the narrative about her has begun shifting, and this is causing her party some serious worries.But win or lose, she has to reckon with the reality that the ground under her has shifted, and she can no longer claim the high moral ground. West Bengal is losing badly on the economic and social stability fronts, and she has to take the lion's share of the blame.At 71, this may well be Mamata Banerjee's last battle. It would have left us with a pleasant memory if she had fought it with courage rather than bile and bitterness.

Mamata is making the Bengal battle personal

Now, suddenly, everybody who stands in Mamata’s way is the enemy. It does not matter if it is the CEC or the SC.

R Jagannathan

Mamata is making the Bengal battle personal

Now, suddenly, everybody who stands in Mamata’s way is the enemy. It does not matter if it is the CEC or the SC.

R Jagannathan

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