The Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) desperation to win power in West Bengal is a powerful reminder of how the party has an appetite for reaching and reacting to every election. Extensive campaigning in the Hyderabad Municipal Corporation elections became the scene of the show with the BJP members and cadres registering and recording their presence in a high decibel campaign against the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samiti in the state. From Yogi Adityanath to JP Nadda, everybody was at their supreme best with accusing other parties of religious chauvinism and communalism, thus polarising the election and electorate.
In Bengal, the BJP has nothing to lose for its lack of organisational weaknesses and contradictions. Relying on propaganda and polemics, they can sail through wherever the stakes are high for the established traditional political party. In Bengal’s case, both CPM and Trinamool have been rivals ever since Mamata Banerjee ousted the Left from the state in 2011.
Besides, the Left has always abstained from coordinating and collaborating on key political themes and issues of the state, such has been the suspicion and cynicism. The BJP has been able to successfully pick and place itself politically, as it is the Left votebank that might largely shift its loyalty to the BJP.
In the 2019 General elections, Left enthusiasts, cadres and supporters voted en bloc for the BJP only to awaken Mamata didi to her senses. Technically, the TMC has an upper hand, but there are enough reasons to be wary of the BJP as it has effectively expanded its footprints into the state. It is with this conviction that the BJP has turned up with a high-decibel electoral rhetoric that is effectively broadcasting its intent.
I am of the considered belief that if the Left were to get less than 20% of the votes, then the BJP, at all costs, will close the gap with the incumbent TMC leaders. Didi acknowledged this fact with the caption “Khela Hobe”, knowing well that she can’t afford to miss this one election, brilliantly categorised by psephologist and pollster Prashant Kishor.
Let them make all sounds like music to their ears, as with its absence, the creative dramatisation couldn’t have been possible.