Stage Set For D-Day

And so it's on, the 13th Assembly elections in West Bengal, the first of the newmillennium.Confounding all pre-poll fears, the campaigning has been unusually peaceful,although it does not guarantee that polling day tomorrow will be peaceful as well. Thetone of the campaign, whether conducted by the ruling Left Front or the Trinamool-Congresscombine has been often bitter, but rarely exceeding the norms of decency, as had happenedduring the two Lok Sabha polls in 1998 and 1999. An additional complicating factor was theunderstandably bitter BJP campaign against the TMC, but even so the attacks against MamataBanerjee could have been more personally vindictive. Contrary to expectations, SamataParty leader George Fernandes did not campaign against the TMC, which disappointed Frontsupporters.

There have been very few allegations levelled against rival groups for violation of thepoll conduct, except a few cases of infringement of sound pollution norms. For the rest,the field is now open for the state administration, polling personnel, and the police totake up positions. Already public transport has been affected in the city and suburbs,with the requisitioning of public vehicles. As for bare statistics, there are 294 seats inthe Assembly. Among these, there are triangular contests in 36 seats and quadrangularfights in 63, there being hardly any straight contests. The main battle will undoubtedlybe between the ruling LF and the TMC-Cong, but the BJP has put up candidates in 250 seats,complicating the picture.

The LF is contesting all seats excepting the GNLF-dominatedareas in north Bengal, while the TMC-Congress together will contest around 270 or so,leaving the rest to the Jharkhand Party, the GNLF and the Kamtapuri Peoples Party,although the KPP has pulled out of any alliance with the TMC.

There are this time 1,623 candidates in the fray, some 300 fewer than in 1996. Only 173are women. The number of voters is around 4,87,00,000. There are 61,500 polling stations,the highest, at 12,000 feet in Darjeeling area and the most inaccessible, at Kalimpong. (Here, it takes about 36 hours for people to register their votes, including the journeyeither way, on average). There would be 170 companies of para-military forces on duty, inaddition to around 150,000 state and Calcutta Police personnel.

Former Chief Minister Jyoti Basu is not contesting this time, but he has campaignedextensively. His successor Buddhadev Bhattacharya has made a good beginning. The LF hasalready created a record by winning five Assembly elections on the trot since 1977.However, this does not mean the Opposition has been sidelined, The Congress except forsome bad reverses, has consistently polled between 35 to 40% of the votes. For the firsttime in 1998 LS polls, the combined Congress, TMC and the BJP votes crossed 50%, exceedingthe total LF votes. This was repeated in 1999 as well. So the LF, in a manner of speakinghas been put on notice. In any case 15 LF ministers were in vote stats, trailing theirOpposition candidates in Assembly segments, in 1999. So a strong anti-incumbency feelingoperates. Still most observers have predicted a narrow victory for the LF in few of thedivisions in the non-Left camp.