Mamata helped BJP rise, says WB Congress

Releasing the manifesto, Congress leadersPradip Bhattacharyya and Saugata Roy told reporters that the Trinamool Congress-BJP alliance had failed to prevent CPI(M) candidates from winning many panchayats seats unopposed. But the Trinamool Congress had “forced” many Congress nominees to withdraw.

The two leaders admitted, however, that the Congress and its allies like the Jharkhand Party and the Forward Bloc (Socialist) had put up candidates for only 32,500 out of 58,430 seats. The party would ask its supporters to vote any candidates other than those of the CPI(M) and the Bharatiya Janata Party in areas where there were no Congress candidates.

The party leaders were reconciled to the fact that in thousands of seats there had been local adjustments between the Congress and the TC-BJP alliance. With no Pradesh Congress Committee president and the entire PCC practically defunct, the leadership was in no position to enforce discipline in the rank and file.

The Congress could not put up candidates for about 12,000 seats even in 1993 when the lastpanchayat elections were held. But it had managed to win 16,400 seats.

Congress president Sonia Gandhi appointed veteran leader and the party’s lone Lok Sabha MP A B A Ghani Khan Choudhury chairman of the panel supervising the panchayat poll campaign. But, barely two weeks before the polls, the party’s campaign seems to be in complete disarray. Former PCC president Somen Mitra or other senior leaders rarely attended the office.

With the TC-BJP almost completely taking over the anti-Left political space, the Congress is unlikely to retain even half of the seats it had won last time. “It’s not something unique to us; the party is in the doldrums in most of the states,” PCC general secretary Pradip Bhattacharyya remarked. With the State Assembly elections due in 2001, the party high command was in no great hurry to set the house in order in West Bengal.