Candidates of change

Candidates of change
Firdous Islam Choudhury

We are giving you the question papers. The answers and interpretations are yours,'' said Biman Bose, the CPI(M) politburo member while handing over computer printouts of the list of Left Front candidates for the ensuing assembly polls last Sunday. What he probably meant was: Give the names a good hard second look and you would read the LF's, particularly the CPI(M)'s mind in finalising the nomination process.

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As the party goes for the toughest ever electoral battle in 24 years, the guiding principles in the nomination process has evidently been to silence dissidence, overhaul the old guard without upsetting ministers and ensuring greater control of Alimuddin Street in governance.

There are a slew of new faces, many of whom found a berth not because of their loyalty to the party but because of their loud dissent and their potential to damage party interests.

Leading the pack is Subhash Chakravarty, the state transport and sports minister. As many as 20 of his followers are said to have made it to the list, the largest being from North and South 24-Parganas and Nadia districts.

Should Chakravarty and his followers accept the list, one would assume there has been a rapproachment of some sort between the ruling coterie in the CPI(M) and a large dissenting faction. ''But the last word probably has not been said yet,'' say party insiders.

Chakravarty's nomination itself is contentious. Before the finalisation of the list, he had said, ''Should I remain in the CPI(M), I would not contest the election but I would fight if I quit the party.'' Much of Chakravarty's utterings have since lost their sanctity and threatening edge, fuelled, no doubt, by Chakravarty's's ,, from Belgatchia (East) constituency.

In the '98 and '99 Lok Sabha polls, the CPI(M) candidates from Dum Dum had a deficit of 35,000 votes in the Belgachia East assembly segment alone from which constituency Chakravarty had won three successive terms, the last being in 1996. There has been massive erosion in the Left vote bank in this pocket, and a jittery Chakravarty wasn't keen to fight from this constituency any more.

The CPI(M)'s move is a shrewd one. It has accommodated atleast five known Chakravarty loyalists in North 24-Parganas alone; at the same time, it's pushed him into a contest that's laid wide open. Chakravarty hasn't spoken out, but the party is on the tenterhooks. ''There is a great churning within the party about the nominations,'' say CPI(M) sources. ''In many areas, you will find that scribblings on walls haven't started even after the candidates' list is released.

Isn't that an indication of possible changes in the list?''

The list also includes political heavyweights like Mohammad Salim, a Rajya Sabha member of the CPI(M), Asim Bala, a former party MP and Nirupam Sen, a central committee member and an emerging party ideologue. Of the three, Salim and Nirupam Sen are certain to get ministerial berths should they win the elections. There's also talk of Sen being tipped as the new finance minister. Both of them are expected to further strengthen the party's leash on government functioning.

It's also evident this year that the CPI(M) has abandoned the line of roping in bureaucrats, social activists, sportsmen, actors and personalities into the electoral fray. In the past, a strong lobby was at work within the party who wanted ''politically marginal'' people to be brought into the party's fold in a bid to gain the support of non-committed voters.

This prerogative is now Mamata Banerjee's - her Trinamool Congress is packed with former bureaucrats, sportsmen and actors. The CPI(M) had just begun to give nominations to actors and singers in the last election. But not this time.Anil Biswas, the politburo member and the most powerful leader in the CPI(M) after Jyoti Basu, said: ''We believe that the election is essentially a political exercise, and we would like it to be so. We would prefer political men to personalities.'' The only exception is Jyotirmoyee Sikdar, the Asiad gold medalist who is being dubbed as a Subhash Chakravarty ''nominee,''. Yet, in keeping with its new dispensation, the party readily accepted her proposal.