Bloc switch puts Left in SMC minority - No-trust motion could take time, hints Aroop; Left parades councillors in unity show

BIRESWAR BANERJEE & AVIJIT SINHA, TT, Siliguri, Aug. 25: The Left today fell into the uncertain political space of running a minority board in the Siliguri Municipal Corporation after a Forward Bloc councillor switched to Trinamul.

The development does not mean the Asok Bhattacharya-led board would topple overnight - Trinamul is six short of the majority number of 24 - but the ruling party has managed to strike a blow at the very point where the Siliguri Model was born - Asok's backyard.

The Siliguri civic board is one of few remaining elected bodies still with the Left that Asok won last year after an informal understanding with the Congress.

The Left calls this arrangement the Siliguri Model and tried to replicate it across the state in the Assembly election but failed miserably.

Today, after the switch of Bloc councillor Durga Singh brought the Left's strength down from 24 to 23 - one short of majority in the 47-member board - the spectre of a failing Siliguri Model may have loomed large again before the Left.

The CPM quickly arranged for a show of strength in the evening, assembling 19 of its 22 councillors in its support - an Independent also supports it - and gave explanations for the three who were missing, among them mayor Asok Bhattacharya.

Trinamul, which had 17 members, now has 18. The Congress has four members and the BJP two.

The Congress had abstained from the election of the mayor. It sits on the Opposition side. When the previous Congress-led SMC board had become a minority, the Left had not brought a no-trust motion against it, letting the Congress run the show for several months.

Whether reciprocal support from the Congress will be in play is to be seen.

Trinamul's Darjeeling district president Gautam Deb had recently spoken about bringing "significant changes in the civic board". Trinamul sources said Singh's defection was the first example of this.

According to rules, Trinamul can bring a no-trust motion against the Left as it has one-third the total number of seats, which is 16. Trinamul has 18 councillors.

But to prove majority later, the party would need the strength of half-plus-one board members, which is 24.

The state's ruling party is six short.

Singh, the councillor of ward V of the SMC, is the member, mayor-in-council for health and parking.

A political observer said: "It is not that the Left board will topple at the SMC tomorrow but the development is significant as, despite several efforts by Asok Bhattacharya and other district Left leaders, there has been a defection."

When asked if Trinamul would bring a no-trust motion against the Left, Aroop Biswas, Trinamul's observer for Darjeeling district, made it clear it would take time.

"It is not a one-day affair. Political developments take place over a period a time and people will have to wait to see the changes," he said.

Ahead of the civic polls last year, all Left candidates who had contested had stood in rows outside the CPM office on Hill Cart Road in Siliguri and taken an oath to "abstain from gluttony and fulfillment of self-interest, reject any such proposal, and most important, strive to defeat an attempt made to frighten them".

On May 4 last year, after the announcement of the poll results and before the formation of the board, most of the Left councillors, including Asok, had moved out of Siliguri to Darjeeling and the Dooars as Mamata Banerjee arrived in Bagdogra that day.

Political sources said Asok might have feared poaching by Trinamul in the Left camp.

"After Trinamul formed the government in the state for the second time, the Darjeeling district leaders took on the task of toppling the Left board with renewed vigour," the political observer said.

Biswas said: "Elected representatives of other parties in rural and civic bodies now want to join Trinamul and expedite development initiated by chief minister Mamata Banerjee."

Following Singh's defection, district Left leaders held a news conference this afternoon and said they would approach the competent authority to cancel Singh's councillorship.

"She is no longer a member of the Forward Bloc. That is why we will seek cancellation of her councillorship," Aniruddha Bose, the Darjeeling district Forward Bloc secretary said.

Jibesh Sarkar, the Darjeeling district convener of Left Front, assembled 19 councillors at the CPM office in a show of unity.

Asok Bhattacharya, the mayor, is in Calcutta to attend a party event while two other councillors are away for personal reasons, he said. Bhattacharya could not be reached despite repeated calls to his cellphone.

Deb said that in rural areas of Siliguri, Trinamul had already started working to gain majority in the lower tiers of the panchayat set-up.

"We have secured majority in 11 of 22 panchayats and also in Phansidewa panchayat samiti (one of the four samitis). Also, we are having an equal number of seats in Matigara panchayat samiti and will soon gain majority. In due course, there will be changes also in the Siliguri Mahakuma Parishad board," Deb, who is the Darjeeling district Trinamul president, said.