Advantage Mamata..... But Banerjee will have to contend with stronger Opp

HT, 17 May 2016, KOLKATA: Bucking a strong antiincumbency trend and overcoming a determined campaign by a united opposition comprising the Left and the Congress, Mamata Banerjee is all set to return to power in Bengal but with fewer number of seats, most exit polls indicated on Monday evening. According to exit polls conducted by TV channels, Bengal’s ruling party may bag between 160 and 170 seats in the 294-seat Assembly.

If the exit poll figures turn out to be true, the number will, however, be lower than the 184 seats that Trinamool won in 2011, and substantially lower than the 203 MLAs than the party has in the outgoing House (courtesy switchovers from the Congress, RSP, Forward Bloc and CPI-M).

“It is proved that Mamata Banerjee’s development initiative has triumphed. People of Bengal are with Mamata Banerjee. However, I think we will do better than the exit polls,” said Subrata Mukherjee, vice-president of Trinamool Congress and the senior-most member of the cabinet.

“I can say that everyone has doubts regarding exit poll surveys in Bengal. The surveys were done outside the polling booths and it is likely that the true picture may not come out,” said Md Salim, CPI(M) politburo member and Lok Sabha MP.

“The Congress-Left Front alliance will win on May 19 and will get 170 seats. Today, Trinamool Congress has won. In this situation the question of coercion and pressure on voters must be counted,” said Om Prakash Mishra, senior Congress leader. ABP Ananda- AC Neilson exit poll says that Trinamool Congress is expected to get 163 seats, while the Left-Congress alliance will bag 126. The survey gave BJP one seat and four to ‘others’. The Times Now C-Voter survey gave Mamata Banerjee 167 seats, Left-Cong alliance 120, BJP four and ‘others’ three seats. India TV exit poll gave Trinamool Congress 167, Left Congress alliance 120 and 7 seats to others.

The ABP- Ananda survey also hinted that the Trinamool Congress will get 44% of the votes followed by the alliance with 42%. The BJP that secured a historic high of 16.8% in 2014 Lok Sabha will shrink to 7%, while ‘others’ will win 7%.

If the results on May 19 reflect these figures, it will mean that Mamata Banerjee has been able to successfully overcome the biggest political challenge her party has faced in its 19 years of existence. The odds against her were many. On the one hand, bitter political rivals, the Left and Congress, came together to prevent fragmentation of opposition votes. On the other, just before the elections, Trinamool Congress was torn apart by a series of scandals.

The Narada sting operation showed that 13 leaders of the party, including MPs, MLAs and ministers, accepting cash from a representative of a fictitious company. It came on the back of the Saradha scam where one of the party’s prominent faces and a former minister has been in jail since December 2014.

Add to that the collapse of a section of an under-construction flyover in North Kolkata that killed 27 people. The disaster happened on March 31, just four days before the first phase of polling on April 4.

But all of these factors, on which the opposition were banking heavily, seem to have no major effect on the support base of the ruling party if the exit polls are found to be correct on May 19.