Green storm gripped Taldangra, once a red citadel today.
Falguni Singhababu, the Trinamul Congress candidate’s victory in the bypoll, defeating BJP’s Ananya Roy Chowdhury by 34,082 votes was just double the vote of CPM’s Debkanti Mahanti (17,642).
Ananya recently deserted the TMC and joined the BJP. Falguni’s father was a CPM leader.
Falguni’s predecessor in the seat Arup Chakraborty was elected as the MP from Bankura seat in this year’s general election and then he was nominated by the TMC for the seat. His mentor Chakraborty, however, was focused on the seat to secure Falguni’s victory. Chakraborty said, “It’s just a matter of time to see Falguni winning the Taldangra polls, especially after 2016 appears to be a cake walk for us.”
Falguni said, “I’ll try to ensure that promises I’d made before the polls are fulfilled properly.”
Ananya was upset and so were her party men. Dr Subhas Sarkar, former MP was heckled by the crowd at the counting centre and he managed to wriggle out of the venue by saying: “Falguni’s victory actually is a victory for the CPM as he comes from a Marxist family.” Ananya said, “Not just Lakshmir Bhandar, something else helped their victory, which is yet to be ascertained.”
CPM’s Manoranjan Patra was the MLA from Taldangra for 20 years from 1996.