3 things Mamata must do to stay the Didi of Bengal
Dressed in her trademark white cotton saree bordered in green - the colour of the Trinamool Congress - and shoulders draped with a thin white cotton chador, Mamata Banerjee stepped out of her humble residence on Harish Chatterjee street in Kalighat and marched towards crowds which had been waiting behind the security barricade since early morning.
This was her first glimpse around half past eleven on Thursday (May 19) morning as election trends made it clear that Didi was returning to power in West Bengal. She refused to answer individual questions, marched quickly in her trademark style with the security trying to keep pace, shook hands with a few people and entered into a packed press conference hall.
It was told that individual interviews would happen only after she had addressed the combined media fraternity. She thanked the national media for its "supportive" role at the press conference and minced no words about what she felt was a regional media house's conspiracy to run a smear campaign against her.
She chose to take questions first from the national media, and then from the regional press. This was significant, because the national stage would be her next arena and Mamata chose to address a larger audience through the national press.
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| Mamata has to keep her clean image intact. |
But Mamata needs to ensure the sixer she hit in these Assembly elections does not become mere statistics in five years when she works out a larger blueprint for the race to 7 RCR in 2019 and for Battlefield Bengal in 2021. And there will be three primary areas of concern if Mamata wants to stay the undisputed Didi in the next crucial political bout:
1. Party and personal integrity
In the 1990s as a young Mamata challenged the heavyweights in West Bengal, her popular slogan would be "Aye Basu dekhey Ja, Mamatar Khomota" (Come Jyoti Basu, and test the might of Mamata).
Today, Mamata does not face a formidable opponent like Jyoti Basu in the state. In fact, it is the lack of strong leaders in the Opposition camp that makes her more powerful. Her last worthy Left opponent, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, was rejected by camps within his own party for a reform process that was seen to be pushed by him alone, before the people rejected him following violence in Singur and Nandigram.
But Mamata will have to live up to the standards of her own personal integrity. She has agitated over the years and paid the Left back in its own coin, and still believes in agitations as a tool to connect with the masses. She claims she is not a VIP but an LIP (Least Important Person) and wants to stay a commoner for the rest of her life.
Ask her if she is tired after the elections and would like to relax, and she replies irritatedly that she never tires of serving the people. But agitations do not fill in for administration as the state's rusty wheels of development proved during the three decades of Left rule.
Mamata can go and sit on a dharna to express shared anger over the collapse of a flyover that killed at least two dozen, but she is the one who rules and must have accountability. Sustaining her biggest asset - her clean image - will be the biggest challenge for Mamata, because honesty begins with the queen but must encompass the coterie and her warriors.
While ironically, five of the legislators caught on camera in the Narada sting operation have managed to win, eight of Mamata's cabinet ministers lost the elections. Factors like internal strife, inaccessibility, arrogance, Congress-Left alliance and Malda riots led to the defeat of seven of them.
On the other hand, textile minister Shyamapada Mukherjee, who was questioned by the CBI and enforcement directorate in the Saradha chit fund scam, and former minister and party heavyweight Madan Mitra, jailed in the Saradha fraud and stung by the Narada bribery tapes, had to pay a heavy price for being corrupt.
In a battle of perception, in which Didi has positioned herself as the clean leader with no diamonds to display, no fancy clothes and simple pair of chappals, she must also clean her house and not choose to remain a "Dhritrashtra" as her partymen are caught in corrupt practices. Voters have given Mamata a second chance and voted for her in spite of her tainted men and this trust must not be broken.
2. Pro-poor to pro-business
The 2016 Assembly election results have been a big thumbs up for Mamata's socialist dole outs. With more than a 170 rural Assembly constituencies, metalled roads, village electrification, rice at Rs 2 per kg and scholarships for women and students proved winning strategies.
Corruption issues were overshadowed by populism. Free treatment in government super speciality hospitals for all also won hearts. In Kolkata, city beautification symbolised her promised "poriborton" after the stagnation under the Left.
However, it is an open secret that the state's economy is in shambles. The Left regime left the state in the red with a financial debt of Rs 2 lakh crore in 2011 as claimed by the Trinamool Congress (TMC). The last five years have done little to lessen the debt burden. Replying during the Question Hour in the Assembly last May, state finance minister Amit Mitra said that the debt repayment amount is set to rise to Rs 9,781 crore in 2016-2017, and that it would multiply to reach a massive Rs 18,359 crore by 2017-2018, adding to the already burdened state.
Chief minister Mamata will have to find ways to keep Central funds coming from her ideological rival, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his government. And the Centre would expect some give and take on legislations like the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Bill to ease West Bengal's enormous fiscal burden.
The government's investment figures have been challenged by the Opposition. Former Bengal Congress President and MLA from Sabong, Manas Bhunia says, "Mamata claims the investment proposed in the state is to the tune of 2 lakh 43 thousand crore rupees in the last four-and-half years. But the invested amount so far adds up to only 6,872 crores, a far cry from what is displayed on paper."
Mamata has held investment summits with business honchos but investments will require for her government to relax land ceiling for industries and change the land acquisition policy. It was her movement against acquisition of farmers' lands in Nandigram and Singur that led to her rise in the state. But that pro-farmer, anti-land acquisition policy is an obstacle to investors coming in. Without industries mushrooming, jobs will be difficult to come by.
West Bengal today has nearly 76 lakh registered unemployed youth. And in 2021 when the state will witness its next electoral battle, if not earlier, there will be anti-incumbency factor which can be challenged not just with statistics but real jobs for the Gen X. Didi will have to strike the right balance between pro-poor and pro-business policies.
3. Not the Left, look out for the Right
In a state where the Left parties ruled for a record 34 years, to be reduced to the third position is a severe humiliation. Mamata brought down their citadel in 2011 as her "Ma, Mati, Manush" slogan resonated across the formerly red state. And in 2016, with a resounding victory for the TMC, the Left has been reduced to a meagre 32 seats out of 294, down 30 seats from its 2011 tally. Mamata not just held on to her supremacy in south Bengal, she also penetrated the CPM bastion of north Bengal.
The Congress managed to grab 44 seats, two more than last time when it had a "mahajot" or grand alliance with the TMC, The Congress had more to gain than the CPM from its alliance with the Left in West Bengal even while fighting each other in Kerala. The Congress' record improved even as the Left was left out.
But it is the BJP that is slowly making inroads here and Mamata needs to be watch out for that. From a meagre 4.03 percent vote share in 2006, the BJP has more than doubled the vote share at over ten per cent. The saffron party improved its Assembly score from a single seat won in the by-polls to three seats in these elections.
Additionally, it has managed a second spot in seven seats, including Jorasanko in north Kolkata. In the Lok Sabha elections of 2014 the party, riding on the Modi wave, made its debut with two seats and 17.02 percent vote share. Since then the party membership has increased from one and half lakh to 42 lakh in the last two years itself with a considerable organisational base now.
Add to this its impressive victory (86/126) in neighbouring polarised state of Assam with significant minority vote share, and it is sure to be a party to reckon with in the next elections. Mamata has openly wooed West Bengal's Muslims while denying minority appeasement.
Her silence over the Malda riots was seen as playing with fire. This has triggered the strengthening of Hindutva slowly in the state with the lotus blooming in a few pockets. The BJP has been playing the Hindu consolidation card along with its pro-development plank showcasing Gujarat to the debt-trapped state of West Bengal. Party insiders say national president Amit Shah, unlike some party leaders in Parliament, does not want to be seen as going soft on Mamata. Subject to outcomes of Assembly polls in 2017 in the largest battleground state of Uttar Pradesh, Mamata's secularism will be pitted against an expanding and aggressive right-wing ideology in the 2019 general elections.
Mamata today is a much matured version of her earlier self. She is still temperamental but does not resort to emotional and knee-jerk reactions in all situations. She understands that when in Opposition she had little to lose. But today at the helm of affairs in the state, she cannot be at war constantly.
And as Didi prepares for a larger national ambition, she will have to keep her image of being clean and honest intact while trying to win over corporates and forging political alliances as well. In 2019, it is the regional force with the likes of Mamata, Nitish Kumar, Arvind Kejriwal and J Jayalalitha that will challenge the might of Modi. And for Mamata to have a nation-wide appeal, she will have to spread herself to other states. Will Didi be able to roar in West Bengal and soar in the country? She is not one to not fight it out.