To a non-partisan onlooker, West Bengal today is an enigma. Open any newspaper, a depressingly negative picture of the state of things hits you in the eyes. Law and order has reached a terrible depth, the economy is wrapped in inertia, the goons of the ruling party are playing havoc. And over this general state of ruins presides a feminine Nero, as golden Bengal burns. This is the unrelenting image that the media have been projecting almost since the new government took over. Yet the ruling party won the Howrah parliamentary byelection single-handedly in June, with its voteshare practically undiminished. Then they handsomely won the panchayat elections. What do you make out of this?