Mamata is chuffed, Opposition feels she can take on Modi in 2019
The two must-visit places in Kolkata are Kalighat’s Kali temple and Mamata Banerjee’s tiled-shade residence a stone’s throw away. With the 2019 general elections in the horizon and the political heat blowing over the country, the political pilgrimage this season is Mamata’s house at Kalighat. She, however, considers the whole of Bengal to be Kalighat, her home.
She is much sought after these days. Every time a politician jumps out of the NDA ship, he or she pays a visit to the West Bengal CM. And she, like a good hostess, is keeping her doors open. Even her once arch-rival, CPI(M), is welcome.
A few weeks ago Praful Patel came calling as NCP leader Sharad Pawar’s emissary. Last Monday Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao visited the state headquarters and rolled on the idea of a non-Congress Federal Front under Mamata’s leadership.
TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu made the first call to Mamata, after quitting the NDA. The Shiv Sena has already vouched support and even a new group under Ram Jethmalani, who was expelled by the BJP, has gone as far as to announce Mamata as the prime ministerial candidate, who has the charisma and guts to challenge Narendra Modi.
Mamata is obviously elated. There is a spring in her steps and smile on her lips. However, she’s still not ready to voice her aspiration and continues to sound humble. “I am a small fry, LIP (Least Important Person), a small squirrel who helped Rama to build the bridge to Lanka,” she says, though she is finding it hard to hide the great churn happening inside.
In her not-so-careful and conscious moments, one is getting to see flashes of an ambitious heart. In political rallies, while talking about the achievements of her governance in the state, she often comes up with “love-your-neighbour-as-yourself” kind of sermons: how important it is to love Odisha, Bihar, Jharkhand and even Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh so on and so forth.
While on the one hand she is appealing to the people and her party workers to help her party win all the panchayat seats, at the same time she’s asking them to be prepared to take the march to Delhi: Chalo Dilli Chalo. Sometimes there are open battle cries against Modi and BJP-led NDA: “First secure Dilli, then think of Bangla (Age Dilli shamla, pore bhabish Bangla)”.
And this is no empty political rhetoric, all sound and fury. At an internal party meeting, while drawing the roadmap of the future course of action, she has made it public: “Concentrate on panchayats, I will manage and take care of Delhi.”
That she’s dreaming of becoming the leader, the face of the Opposition as a prime ministerial candidate becomes obvious in her refusal to be led by the Congress. That she doesn’t take to Rahul Gandhi kindly is no secret now, dismissing him as a political novice, and a Congress-convened Opposition platform will obviously imply Rahul, as the scion of the Nehru-Gandhi family, as the natural inheritor of the top post.
Already Telangana CM K Chandrashekhar Rao has made it clear that the alternative to the BJP cannot be the Congress: “Both are dangerous in their political ideology and dangerous for the nation.”
Mamata feels that the platform, challenging the NDA, needs to be a level playing field, with no big-brotherly attitude and highhandedness. Having the Congress will end such a possibility. If Sonia Gandhi, given the respect she commands, had been at the helm, things would have been different, but Rahul is a different story altogether. He cannot be in league with stalwarts such as Chandrababu Naidu, Sharad Pawar, Mamata Banerjee, Mayawati and Naveen Pattnaik.
Moreover, some of the regional parties have openly said that given their stand on "neo-liberal" and "imperialistic" policies, joining hands with the Congress is the last thing in their mind.
Incidentally, most of the parties in the Opposition feel that the Congress might not be in a position to demand the leader’s post after poll results. Except for Gujarat and some by-polls, the Congress is yet to uphold any stellar performance to its credit. In case of Gujarat too, regional factors under Hardik Patel and Jignesh Mevani played a big role.
In contrast, Mamata Banerjee appears to be acceptable across the political spectrum. She has a personal relationship with many leaders and given her history of being a fighter, who has toppled three-decades of Left rule in Bengal and struggled her way from being a lone MP party to being the third largest party in Parliament, seems to be a bankable option.
Moreover, her lone tirade against the Modi government on demonetisation, GST and Aadhaar issues and her proving to be almost prophetic about the outcome in each of these cases, is giving her an additional mileage of being dependable and farsighted than many. Mamata, unlike Congress, is not into dinner politics to beg for consensus. She, as a leader, has often lead from the front and shown the way. Consensus, no wonder, is growing on her, over her.
(Courtesy of Mail Today)