West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's decision to join Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his forthcoming visit to Bangladesh, scheduled for early next month, is an extremely significant one. It has ramification both for Indo-Bangladesh ties as well as political developments at home.
Modi's visit to Bangladesh, beginning June 6, is being seen as an extremely important one in diplomatic circles in the capitals of the two countries and beyond.
Mamata's decision to join the Prime Ministerial delegation is a big feather in Modi's cap. The Bengal chief minister had opted out of Congress Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's Dhaka trip in September 2011, which also led him to take off the Teesta River Water Sharing Agreement with Bangladesh from the table because of Mamata's opposition.
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The agreement on Teesta may still be off the table. But Mamata's being part of Modi's delegation clearly indicates a much broader political consensus in India to strengthen and deepen ties with Bangladesh under Sheikh Hasina's leadership.
The smooth passage of the Land Boundary Agreement in ?P?arliament earlier in the month with support of wide range of political parties were the first signs to indicate a growing interest in India to invest heavily in its relations with Bangladesh. Armed with the Land-Boundary Agreement (LBA) and Mamata by his side, Modi can drive the point home about the broadest possible consensus in India to deepen and strengthen ties with Bangladesh during his talks with the political leadership in Dhaka.
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Few would doubt that the LBA was a long pending issue which should have been resolved much earlier, and now, it can well pave the way for restoring the confidence and trust in Dhaka to invest even further in its ties with India.
While many more agreements are likely to be signed during Modi's visit which will also reflect the widening cooperation between the two sides on a range of areas of mutual interest and concern, the Mamata-Modi collaboration will have wider ramification in India.
The two had not only shared a dias in Kolkata when the Prime Minister visited the city in April this year, but the toning down of political rhetoric against each other at the event and their visible warmth and cordiality had indicated of an evolving political arrangement between the two.
The Chief Minister and her close aides had been under tremendous pressure since last year over their alleged involvement in the multi-crore Saradha scam. Indian security agency reports, collaborated by the Hasina government about presence of Jamaat-e-Islami and other religious fundamentalist elements in West Bengal — some of whom were said to be getting support from local Trinamoo?l leaders — had only made matters worse for Mamata.
But despite these pressures, much of which was also being engineered by Delhi, Mamata's emphatic victory in the recently held municipal and local bodies election in the state convinced the BJP leadership that she cannot be defeated and ousted from Bengal so easily.
This wisdom also forced Modi and his party colleagues to offer the olive branch to Mamata and enlist her support for the land acquisition and other important bills that are yet to be passed in parliament. Though the BJP has the majority in Lok Sabha, it will have to enlist support of other regional parties like Mamata's Trinamoo?l, to get the land bill and other important legislations passed in the Rajya Sabha.
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One clear indication of the compromise reached between the two sides became evident recently when BJP leader and Union home minister, Rajnath Singh, refused to mention the Saradha scam and Mamata's involvement at a public rally in Kolkata, even though he was requested to do so by the state unit of the party.
For now this alliance between Mamata and Modi may work. But it remains to be seen whether it ? will firm up or fall apart after a few months.
