National

Sister Blitzer At Housework

South Calcutta: MamataBanerjee

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Sister Blitzer At Housework
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Indeed, Mamata Banerjee’s stature is not limited to her constituency. Her agenda as a parliamentarian extends beyond South Calcutta into the realm of larger national politics. But is she too taken up with making things uncomfortable for the Left to care for her constituency? Outlook tried to gauge the development work Mamata initiated in her constituency.

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The South Calcutta constituency is spread over a large area and includes people with disparate living standards and income. It can be broadly divided into four socio-economic categories. Around 50 per cent live in slums. Of the rest, 30, 15, and 5 per cent belong to the middle-class, upper-middle-class and very wealthy category respectively.

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"Obviously most of the developmental work that Didi does targets slum-dwellers and the lower-middle-class category," explains a tmc insider, "for whom basic amenities like water, sanitation and electricity are urgent requirements." She has spent lakhs from her MPLADS fund for slum development work, including construction of toilets, laying of pipes for supply of drinking water and providing electricity. Mamata has, in fact, been working closely with councillors of her constituency.

In the congested slum at Ward No. 85, she has spent Rs 25 lakh for construction of toilets. And in Ward Nos. 113 and 114 at the Lockgate Jhupdi, Mamata used her funds to instal water pipes, provide electricity connections and construct toilets. "Sanitation is a major thrust area," Farid Hakim, a local councillor, explains. Nevertheless, a visit to the slum with him sees groups of women, complaining of water shortage and lack of toilets, throng around him.

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Mamata has also made a point of not neglecting the middle class. From her education fund, other than the customary free schools for slum children, Mamata has donated Rs 10 lakh from her MPLADS fund for adding an extra floor to the Ashutosh College building.

Her visibility and the way she makes common cause with the poor have been her biggest strengths as far as the lower-middle-class section of her constituency is concerned. But there are some from the affluent, upper-middle and middle classes who are clearly upset with Didi. Says a businessman: "I am very unhappy because of what she did in Singur." Bir of Ballygunge, who stays at an upper-class neighbourhood, scathingly adds, "It makes my blood boil to see Narendra Modi smile on television and the Nano roll out from outside Bengal. It’s not a question of what she does for the constituency. Mamata is a national leader and how she conducts herself at the national level is what matters."

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