Saumyen's Pages
The Bengal Electoral Mindset – A Probasi Viewpoint
(June 2016)
Finally the result is out … after a long drawn election over 1.5 months, Mamata Banerjee is back in power in West Bengal for the second term. This time with a bigger number of 211 out of 294 Assembly seats. She has taken the oath at a public ceremony in Kolkata last month alongwith her 42 other ministers to “continue with the Development agenda”. In a recent gathering of her Party colleagues in Kolkata, she has emphasised the need to focus on being with people. The 2019 election is the next one she is looking at.
I have observed this election period over the last 6 months from another State when I had access to national and local media from Bengal. I believe to have intelligence to filter the non-stop flow of news (opinions more than news in most cases) to interpret them in a common man way. This is a view of the election outcome from a perspective of this common man – who is a Bong but lives outside Bengal.
Left-Congress Tactical Alliance
The West Bengal poll has witnessed deaths of common people (some apparently are termed as party workers – as if they are complimentary) and injury of several, unprecedented use of social media to influence the relatively young and first time voters, avoidable use of abusive language and mar slinging among the political entities and above all, rise of an otherwise impossible political cartel between two rival political parties. I term this as cartel as it’s tactical with one single agenda to defeat the ruling party. We have not seen any strategic alliance in terms of common minimum agenda (like UPA), common governance framework for long term sustainability and even a common leader of the alliance – acceptable to all these parties. While it is referred to as a “JOTE” (alliance) by some, the Left Front Chairman denied by saying it’s a pre-poll vote sharing arrangement. The alliance unfortunately lacks credibility to the electorate – thanks to the age-old apparent rivalry between the Left Front and the Congress.
Single Showmanship
This is a win of Mamata vis-à-vis her party. As Mamata proclaims, “I am the candidate in all 294 seats … vote for me”. While that shows her confidence level of the electorate’s confidence on her, it also proves that she is the Party and any candidate is a notional mortal representative on her behalf. She has driven the election by herself – attending more than 200 meeting by herself. It’s similar to a time in Indian cricket, when we used to call Kapil Dev as our opening bowler, our change bowler, our strike bowler etc. etc.
Secondly, her control on the local Party leaders have been questioned when multiple incidents of intra-party violence occurred across the State. Unlike CPI-M, TMC is not cadre based and organizational hierarchy is not well defined and if defined, is not adhered to. The influx of local goons from other parties to TMC has helped the Party to acquire local controls in some areas, but has systematically ruined the control that otherwise is needed to hold the party in the long run. Hence Mamata’s strategy to project herself for winning the election is deliberate. She has used her charisma to influence the electorate (Fan Club to be more accurate) and that has worked.
Bhadrolok’s opinion matters less
Unlike elsewhere in India, West Bengal has two pronounced and visible classes – “Bhadralok” (and section thereof is “buddijibi” – intellectuals) and sadharon lok (common man). Bhadralok are the class who are educated, well versed with Bengal literature and culture, expressive on any political and/or social incidents and most of them are equally versed in Rabindra Sadan and Calcutta Club. Mamata could generate support of this group in the 2011 elections (thanks to Singur, Nandigram agitation etc.) and a significant chunk of the Intellectuals from Kolkata deserted her over the last 5 years over conflicts on issues or ideology. While Mamata tried to align more closely with this team and also carried books/ recited poems in functions in the initial years, she realised that maintaining equation with this opinionated group is costly. While this group has a say, the influence of them on the other group (Sadharon lok) is apparently not as strong as it was a few decades back.
2.5 months effort not good enough
I would have been surprised if a State election were won with 2.5 months of preparation! JOTE underestimated the effort and dedication to win the electorate. I do not believe that the JOTE leadership was not aware of this. They started very late and decided to create a hype around corruption, non-transparency in decision etc. of TMC and leveraged the entire energy in the negative campaign. Veterans like Mr Biman Bose were aware of the low winning potential and hence the Party never propagated their manifesto well to the electorate. Instead, the JOTE banked on creating a negative image of the TMC. The personal attack on Mamata was cleverly orchestrated to influence Mamata’s Fan club!
Digital Connect no substitute for People Touch
After a long time, the Leftist “Bhadraloks” were awake. The team created and portrayed a negative image for TMC and more specifically Mamata – significantly through the social media! While it possibly reached the young urban electorate, it apparently did not have any impact as they are not otherwise influenced by the Leftist or Congress ideology. This is because that their presence was hardly felt in the last 5 years of TMC rule. On the other hand, it certainly did not have any impact on the large electorate in rural areas.
What it means is that the electorate connect is lost between the Left and the rural mass – thanks to the degeneration of their organisation across the state and lack of new leadership at the grassroots. Also the goon class that used to amass support through various means has already shifted sides. A hurriedly formed JOTE before the election did not have time to reach out to the masses to “show the dream when they are back to power”, accordingly to a Left leader in a recent Television interview.
Scare vs Intent
The elections in West Bengal have traditionally been relatively more violent than most of the other States. I have never witnessed the similar level of enthusiasm around election (even a local body one) elsewhere. Some of the previous elections (Municipal, panchayat etc.) have been marred with violence and rigging and hence the opposition was anticipating the similar trend. However, the 7 phase election over 1.5 months have diluted the possibility. This has also helped to obtain a very high percentage of polls in most constituencies. Initially, that was interpreted by the Left leadership as their support for “Paribarton”, the result showed the intent of the electorate to strengthen Mamata’s hands.
Economics drive politics
Mamata realised that the mass electorate that had supported the Left rule for 34 years have to be converted to support her – and like the Left rule’s “Paiye debo” (will get you) strategy needs a similar followup. The schemes of cycles for girls, money deposits for girls, rice at Rs 2 have been introduced or leveraged to create a loyal group of beneficiaries in her rural electoral base. While in the Left front rule, the ration (public distribution) system became corrupt to provide the services, Mamata ensured the delivery of the benefits to the target groups. While we may debate of the efficacy of this economic strategy, the efficiency of delivery is surely good.
Trust vs short memory
The incumbency factor that played well for BJP in the Parliament election in 2014, was not strong in West Bengal. There are multiple reasons for the same. Apart from the economic benefits that reached to a large section of the rural population, Mamata’s periodic visit as the CM to remote places portrayed an image of genuine intent for the development of the area. Her visit to Jangal Mahal, Purulia etc. has been unique by a West Bengal CM in last 20 years! Mamata knew the difficulty of getting industry to this State and hence her focus in the tenure was on Infra development – road construction, electrification of villages etc. that can be showcased as precursors for industrialization. This not only created an image of progress among the electorate, her visits to these areas posed a genuine intent of the leader for the development. This apparently helped create a Trust on Mamata so that the issues like Sharda, Narda were ignored by the electorate or forgotten. We all have short memory!
In summary, the choice for Mamata by electorate was an obvious one in the current circumstances. Moreover, one of the key characteristics of Bengal election over the last 40 years is that the electorate has always driven a mandate that virtually leave an insignificant opposition. When it was the Left Front, they won with a large mandate and so was TMC in 2011. This election is no exception. The results, from this perspective, has always been very different from TN and Kerala.
We learnt that Left and Congress JOTE is going to continue – according to the leaders of both Parties. A combined opposition is always warranted when a Party comes to power with massive majority, but if history is to be believed, this JOTE is likely to have a short life. Hope this time this is proved wrong for Bengal’s sake.
(The view expressed by the author is personal)
Rewind