Didi takes in NCP,rebellion brews in Cong and SUCI

Mamata Banerjee has broadened her alliance in West Bengal by bringing in UPA ally NCP,allotting it one seat of 294.

Mamata Banerjee has broadened her alliance in West Bengal by bringing in UPA ally NCP,allotting it one seat of 294. The decision comes a day after the Trinamool Congress forced the Congress to accept Mamatas terms. Trinamool leader Mukul Roy said the NCP was given the Dinhata seat in Cooch Behar after talks between Mamata and NCP chief Sharad Pawar.

Dinhata was part of the Trinamool Congresss original list. The Trinamool had named Mihir Goswami as the candidate for Dinhata,a seat currently represented by the partys Ashok Mondal. The seat will now be contested by Amiya Sarkar,the state NCP president.

Of the total 294 seats,the Trinamool Congress will contest 227 and the Congress 65.

Two Congress MLAs,Ram Piyare Ram and Abdul Khalek Molla,have threatened to contest as Independent candidates after they were displaced from their seats in the seat-sharing arrangement.

The SUCI had been given two seats,but it has decided to rebel and will contest 19 seats. It will field candidates against 17 candidates of the Congress. Yet it insists that its biggest adversary is the Left Front.

In terms of proportion,the Congress share is less than what it got in the Lok Sabha elections. It had contested 14 seats then,a third of the total of 42 LS seats,while the 65 it has now is less than a fourth of the 294 Assembly seats.

Shakeel Ahmed,AICC observer for West Bengal,has admitted that the alliance has been made on the basis of ground realities.