Mamata Banerjee’s two-decade-long unwavering struggle against the Communists finally bore fruit in the Lok Sabha results today. As she walked out of her humble house on Harish Chatterjee street in Kalighat, South Kolkata, flashing a victory sign, she had come a long distance from 2004, when she had emerged as the lone MP of her party. Today, she was striding with 20 seats behind her, with her alliance partner Congress’s another six.

“A storm of change has swept Bengal this time,” Mamata said. “The people have lost confidence in the Left Front government in Bengal. We will ask the Government at the Centre to conduct Assembly polls as early as possible. This government has become a minority and the Left has become redundant in national politics.” Mamata herself won by a margin of over 2.21 lakh votes, highest among opposition winners.

Emerging as the Congress’s largest partner, Mamata got congratulatory calls from both Sonia Gandhi and Pranab Mukherjee. According to sources, the Trinamool may get three Cabinet berths, including at least one Cabinet-rank post certain to be bagged by Mamata. The Trinamool chief, who is expected to come to Delhi early next week, is reportedly also keen to get least one of her two minority MPs a ministerial post.

It was in the ‘70s that Mamata first launched her struggle against the CPM as a small worker in the Congress. In 1984, she gave the first hints of what she was capable of when she was elected as an MP from Jadavpur defeating Somnath Chatterjee.

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