By IANS,
Kolkata : A resurgent Trinamool Congress-Congress combine Tuesday swept the West Bengal assembly by-elections winning eight of the 10 seats, dealing a blow to the beleaguered ruling Left Front that could bag only one seat. An independent took the 10th seat.
Although the Nov 3 by-elections were mainly held in areas considered opposition citadels, the Left was desperate for a good showing since the next assembly elections are due in 2011.
Despite contesting separately, the Congress and the Trinamool won seven of the 10 constituencies in 2006. The Left Front had won three.
Continuing with its electoral victories since the Lok Sabha sweep of May, the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool bagged all the seven seats it contested, retaining five and wresting Belgachia East and Rajganj from its arch rival Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) in the vote count Tuesday.
The Congress, which was in the fray in three constituencies, finished with one seat. It retained its traditional stronghold Sujapur in Malda district but conceded the prized Goalpokhar seat in North Dinajpur district to the Forward Bloc, a Left Front ally.
It was the only success for the Left Front, which was defeated in all the other nine seats.
The Kalchini seat in north Bengal’s Jalpaiguri went to an independent. And, in a clear sign of the hard times to follow, the CPI-M drew a blank despite pitting candidates in five constituencies.
Trinamool candidates were re-elected from Bongaon, Serampore, Alipore, Contai South and Egra.
The victor in Sujapur was late Congress leader A.B. Gani Khan Chowdhury’s brother Abu Nasser Khan Chowdhury. He won by 29,479 votes.
In a startling result, the Gorkha Janamukti Morcha-backed independent Wilson Champamari won from Kalichini in north Bengal’s Jalpaiguri district. The Adivasi Vikas Parishad nominee finished second, leaving the more established political parties far behind.
Left Front partner Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) finished third and the Congress fourth in the seat, which comprises a large number of tea gardens in the foothills of the Darjeeling Himalayas known as the Dooars.
In Alipore, Trinamool’s Bobby Hakim trounced his nearest rival Kuastav Chatterjee of the CPI-M by 27,555 votes. The seat, a Trinamool stronghold, falls in Mamata Banerjee’s Kolkata South parliamentary constituency.
Trinamool’s triumph in Belgachia (East) on Kolkata’s outskirts was a big triumph for the party and a severe heartbreak for the Left as it had elected popular CPI-M leader Subhas Chakraborty seven times since 1977. Chakraborty died earlier this year, and the CPI-M tried to cash in on a perceived sympathy wave by nominating Chakraborty’s widow Ramala against Trinamool leader Sujit Bose.
In the end, the move boomeranged, and Bose sailed home with a massive 28,360 margin, which was more than the lead taken by Chakraborty in any of the elections.
Rajganj was another example of the CPI-M’s decline since the April-May Lok Sabha battle. Then, CPI-M’s Mahendra Kumar Roy, a sitting legislator from Rajganj, had taken a massive 26,000 plus lead from the segment. But the scene dramatically changed this time as Trinamool’s Khageswar Ray was elected with a margin of over 15,000.
With the Left slowly losing grip over the state that it has ruled since 1977, under the assault of the Trinamool-led opposition, the by-elections were considered a trailer to the 2011 assembly elections.