Red-faced in West Bengal

: The panchayat poll setback for the Left, and particularly for the Marxists in Bengal, comes as a bitter medicine that it needed for long to mend itself. The poll showed for the first time in 30 years of CPM-led Left rule that there suddenly has emerged a formidable political opposition to it in the rural segment.

In terms of pure statistics, the Left vote share (read the CPM) according to preliminary estimates has gone down by 8 per cent to 10 per cent. It has been a remarkable sweep away from the ruling party that hardly anyone could have assessed. The current setbacks, for the ruling regime, if calculated in terms of assembly seats, should account for 71 assembly seats that the Left should deduct from its present kitty of 235 seats it had won in the 2006 state assembly polls.

There are more stunning statistics. For instance, at the lowest tier of the panchayati raj system in Bengal, the Left’s supremacy was unquestionable. In the 2003 panchayat polls, it had won 71 per cent of the gram panchayat (the lowest tier) seats, 86 per cent of the panchayat samiti (middle tier) seats and 86 per cent of the zilla parishad (uppermost tier) seats. In this election, it has come down to 50.71 per cent (lowest tier), 57 per cent (middle tier) and 61 per cent (uppermost tier) respectively.

Forcible land acquisition has undoubtedly factored in these upset results that cut across a wide spectrum of districts in South Bengal. The phenomenon was not restricted to Nandigram or Singur alone. Even areas that did not see much of Mamata Banerjee in terms of campaigns did show resounding support for the opposition. A strong anti-incumbency wave is more than evident. Voters were up in arms in distant pockets of North Bengal as well.

There are underlying messages in this outcome that certainly go beyond the issue of mere farmland acquisition for industry. The Government backtracked from the land acquisition bid at Nandigram in the face of stiff opposition. But what it did not rescind was the “cadre raj”. The people of Bengal were witness to some of the worst versions of CPM-sponsored cadre raj that had had a cascading effect that went beyond the confines of Nandigram or Singur. The state police and the party’s armed cadres working in tandem to terrorise, torture and kill villagers might have been a familiar face...

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