Kolkata, Dec 24 (Ajit Weekly News) It seems as of now that the Darjeeling Lok Sabha constituency in the northern sector of West Bengal is heading for an extremely interesting three-cornered contest in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
According to political observers, Darjeeling will be one of the few Lok Sabha seats where polling for a national election will be held under the shadow of local issues with the “son of the hills” sentiment playing a prominent factor in election campaigns.
Considering that there will be a three-cornered contest in the hills between the BJP, the Trinamool Congress (TMC)-Bharatiya Gorkha Prajatantrik Morcha (BGPM) alliance and the Congress-Left Front bloc, political observers say that the most crucial factor might be a probable Left Front-backed Congress candidate.
There are strong rumours in the hills that influential and estranged TMC hill leader, Binay Tamang, who joined the Congress recently, might be fielded by the country’s oldest national party in Darjeeling next year as a Left Front-supported Congress candidate.
There is information that the CPI(M), the principal force in the Left Front, is agreeable to the proposal of the Congress on this count.
From the time Tamang has joined the Congress, he has been constantly fuelling the “son of the hills” sentiments as he is constantly claiming that the real development for the people of the hills will never be possible unless a local gets the chance to represent the people in Parliament.
Tamang has also said that as the successive BJP Lok Sabha members were not “sons of the hills,” they were not serious about the issues exclusively relating to development of the hills.
The possibility of the Congress projecting Tamang as its Lok Sabha candidate has been made stronger by state Congress President Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, appointing Tamang as in charge of the Congress’ organisational affairs in the hills as the state General Secretary.
Political observers are of the opinion that with Tamang constantly fuelling the local sentiment issue, other burning issues like price rise and financial corruption in West Bengal have taken a back seat in the hills.
“As the election draws near, Tamang will surely fuel the local leader issue and in case he is finally nominated as the Left Front-backed Congress candidate, he will ramp it up even further. This is something which the parties opposing the Congress and Tamang will not be able to ignore,” said a political analyst.
However, political observers feel that the existing situation might change in case the Congress enters into a seat-sharing understanding with the TMC after snapping ties with the Left Front. As part of the understanding, the Congress will have to sacrifice the Darjeeling Lok Sabha seat in favour of the TMC-BGPM combine.
“In that case, officially, there will be a three-cornered contest between the BJP, the Congress-TMC-BGPM combine and the Left Front. However, in reality the contest will be mainly between the BJP and the Congress-TMC-BGPM combine, considering that the organisational strength and popularity of the Left Front in the hills are negligible. And in the absence of Tamang in that eventuality, the hype over the “son of the hills” issue will also fade out to a great extent,” the political analyst said.
However, barring that remote eventuality, the “son of the soil” hype created by Tamang, has already started having its effect on the other political forces in the fray in the hills.
An indication on this count has come from the BGPM founder Anit Thapa who has given a loaded but extremely significant message to the TMC leadership about the choice of the candidate for the alliance for the 2024 polls.
“Let there be the TMC symbol in the hills but not the party leaders to that extent” was the message from Thapa last week. Thapa’s signal was clear that the TMC might field its candidate in the hills in 2024 but the BGPM’s preferences in candidate-selection should be honoured by the ruling party leadership.
–Ajit Weekly News
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