Bengal has been painted green, a day ahead of World Environment Day, today and most of the seats in the twin Burdwan and Bankura have also gone ‘overwhelmingly’ green.
The Trinamul Congress harvested fresh green crops from the saffron farmlands of Bardhaman Durgapur, Bankura and even substantially outdated BJP’s victory in Bishnupur seat where the national party has won by a meagre 5,567 votes. TMC’s Sujata Mondal had a neck-to-neck contest against her former husband Soumitra Khan but lost.
Soumitra had won the seat by 78,047 votes in 2019 when Sujata had campaigned for him as a Calcutta High Court order had barred Khan’s entry to Bishnupur. Sujata said, “Whole constituency was with Didi this year, but something might have gone a bit wrong that we need to ascertain.” Khan himself had repeatedly claimed that his victory was eased after Sujata’s nomination. After this victory, he said, “Had there been anyone else against me, my fate amidst this green wave could be much harder. Also, I suspect some BJP men were hand-in-glove with TMC.”
The BJP, ambitious to retain the Bardhaman Durgapur seat had assigned its firebrand leader Dilip Ghosh, who faced a choking trail by 1.37 lakh votes. His former party colleague, cricketer-turned-politician Kirti Azad made his debut in Bengal politics defeating a heavyweight like Ghosh. Mr Azad said, “It’s actually our Didi’s victory and I can tell you, the chief ministers of other states have already started following her model of development.” An over-confident Dilip who’d suggested Kirti to buy a return ticket to Delhi however failed to buy his own ticket to Delhi, incidentally.
A shattered Mr Ghosh after his defeat said, “Our vote share in most of the seats hasn’t decreased, though in Durgapur we lost some votes.” He told his party insiders that he’s fallen victim of an organized sabotage by a section of his own party. The Durgapur East and Durgapur West Assembly segments that had contributed a massive 76,000 lead in favour of BJP in 2019, however failed to garner support for Dilip this year. Dilip trailed by 1,692 votes behind TMC in East but lost 11,682 votes ahead of Kirti in West.
“The CPM votes in these two segments didn’t migrate substantially like in 2019, which made Kirti’s job easier,” said Pradip Majumdar, state’s panchayat minister.
In Bankura, Dr Subhas Sarkar, BJP’s poster boy in south Bengal was defeated by TMC’s Arup Chakraborty by a margin of 32,708 votes. Hindu Mahasabha had fielded Jibon Chakraborty, a BJP rebellion against Subhas’s alleged anarchy. Jibon had given a call for ‘No vote for Subhas’. In the seat, 2.36 lakh Nota votes have been recorded. Jibon secured 3,400 votes. He said: “It’s my war against a corrupt man.”
In Bardhaman Purba seat, TMC’s Dr Sharmila Sarkar had a clean sweep over BJP’s folk singer candidate Asim Sarkar by a margin of 1.60 lakh votes. Asim said: “I tried my best but Dr Sarkar was a far better candidate than me. I appreciate her victory.” Dr Sarkar said: “It’s more Didi’s victory than that of mine. She’s groomed me and brought me to politics.”