The success of Mamata Banerjee’s manoeuvres in checking the BJP’s rise in West Bengal this general election suggests that India’s only chief minister was always confident of victory
Illustration/Uday Mohite
West Bengal had the highest turnout in the 2024 general elections. Often even hovering around 80 per cent, over seven phases. How does one interpret voters stepping out in such huge numbers in the scorching heat?
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General perception is it conveys a mood to dislodge the establishment. Only, the establishment in West Bengal equally means Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s BJP at the Centre, and Mamata Banerjee’s TMC, with solid hold at the ground-level in the state.
That is, ever since Mamata held back BJP to a mere 77 seats in the 2021 Assembly elections, while Modi’s campaign was aimed at crossing 200, coined the same way as “400 paar!”
He was looking to expand his party’s influence in the state, post their jump in general elections from three to 18 seats, between the 2014 and 2019
general elections.
From Mamata’s end, the 2021 shadow-campaign was effectively managed by political aide Prashant Kishor and his team at the consultancy firm, I-PAC.
While these polls were still on, Kishor — now a politician in Bihar — stuck his neck out on record to say the BJP will deliver a major surprise; emerging as the single largest party in West Bengal.
That’s not how West Bengal voted. It’s semi-safe to suggest they stepped out of homes in such large numbers to check the rise of BJP, instead. Voting resolutely in favour of Mamata over Modi.
During the early phase of elections, gauging body language and potentially divisive comments/speeches by members of the BJP, including PM Modi himself — it appeared the ruling party was playing catch-up, sensing a dip in their tally.
The one state they were doing well in at this point, though — and they knew this then — was, in fact, West Bengal. Because the early phases of polls were held in northern Bengal (seats such as Cooch Behar, down to Darjeeling) that BJP currently considers its stronghold.
The western part of the state was where it had equally swept in 2019. They couldn’t retain these parts. West Bengal was being eyed by the Modi campaign as a prime catchment area—cashing in on the positive trend established in 2019.
Pollsters were similarly forecasting a major gain for BJP in West Bengal—at least upwards of 25 seats (even touching 31), from 18 out of 42. The same pollsters had ascribed BJP numbers way past 100 in the Assembly elections.
It’s hard to predict West Bengal. Let alone convincingly decipher Mamata’s magic. Apart from Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra, West Bengal hit Modi the hardest in 2024, with BJP’s tally dropping to 12.
Was India’s only woman chief minister confident of this victory? Why else would she choose to technically remain in the INDIA bloc, yet share not a seat with the partners, Left and the Congress, in the elections?
Consider that she even brought in cricketer Yusuf Pathan to cut the votes of Congress and defeat its state president, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, in Beharampur. She had already poached Shatrughan Sinha from the Congress, who’s delivered again from Asansol. West Bengal was going to be Mamata’s battleground alone.
The key to which has always been the bellwether constituencies of Kolkata, where she swept again, along with her chief campaigner and nephew, Abhishek Banerjee, picking up the Diamond Harbour seat.
If the 2024 election results are to be interpreted as a vote for a stronger Opposition, then Mahua Moitra, among the fiercest voices in Parliament, got a return ticket from Krishnanagar, despite having been evicted from the floor of the house in the last session.
Like all humans, West Bengal’s heart was on the Left, once. That was until Mamata pretty much finished off the party in 2011, after its 34 years of continuous rule. How did she do it? By being more Left than the Left — opposing private industries in the state, starting with Singur, for an electoral issue.
Contrast this with Mamata of 2024, with the TMC, only second to BJP, in electoral bond donations — providing it enough money essential to take on the excessively loaded party at the Centre. The street muscle was always there.
Political consultancy firm, I-PAC, minus Prashant Kishor, still manages Mamata’s campaign. You have to see for yourself I-PAC’s sophisticated modules, data-crunching, social media prompts, vast army of volunteers and mass-connect programmes to sense how seriously and scientifically TMC takes the elections.
Such as ways to counter Sandeshkhali, for instance, where a local Muslim don, Shahjahan Sheikh and his men were accused of atrocities against women.
BJP turned this into a national issue, bearing Mamata’s women vote bank in mind, and fishing out a Hindu-Muslim card. I-PAC was working furiously to counter this, when we visited their office during the elections. Guess who won Basirhat, where Sandeshkhali is, in West Bengal, after all? TMC.
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Seats BJP won in WB during 2019 LS poll
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