Krishna Kirtania, a resident of North 24-Parganas’ Gaighata, is unsure about whom to vote.
A member of the Matua community, Krishna had voted the BJP like most others in his community in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Early on Sunday, Krishna visited Thakurbari, the headquarters of the Matua sect in North 24-Parganas’ Thakurnagar, in search of clarity.
He spoke through the day with both factions of the Thakur family one owing allegiance to Trinamul and the other to the BJP. The members of the family are direct descendants of Harichand Thakur, the founder of the Matua sect. The area votes on April 22.
Swapan Majumder on the campaign trail.
Bongaon South is one of 68 assembly constituencies in Bengal that are reserved for the Scheduled Castes. The majority of the voters are Matua Namasudra Dalits who trace their ancestry to what was once East Bengal. Most came over during Partition and after the formation of Bangladesh, fleeing religious persecution. There is no official data, but they are estimated to number nearly one crore across the state. Many arenât citizens yet, so the BJP is doling out the promise of citizenship to win them over.
The Hindutva party has fielded Swapan Majumder, an associate of BJP MP and All India Matua Mahasangha president Shantanu Thakur, to take on Alo Rani Sarkar of the Trinamool Congress. Sarkar is a BJP turncoat.
Election watch from across the Bengal border
Updated:
Updated:
April 19, 2021 01:14 IST
Bangladesh waits to see whether the poll result in West Bengal impacts its identity as an inclusive, progressive society
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Bangladesh waits to see whether the poll result in West Bengal impacts its identity as an inclusive, progressive society
As the high-profile contest in India’s State elections in West Bengal is under way, Bangladeshis are curious onlookers not only because of the geographic proximity and strong socio-cultural ties between the two Bengals but also on account of the ramifications the electoral outcome may have on India-Bangladesh relations.
This is not 2019 and this is not the Lok Sabha elections. And it’s not hunky dory for the BJP anymore.
There is no apparent wave in its favour which will clean sweep all its opposition into the Bay of Bengal. Neither here in Bongaon, nor in the rest of the Bengal, though the BJP certainly has its share of committed, loyalist, or, silent and floating voters, including those who have been polarized, those who hate the Trinamool Congress for various reasons, and those who want some kind of change at the top. However, it is still not clear if that would help them cross the 100 mark in the 2021 assembly. Seasoned journalists say that even 80 could be tough.
West Bengal Assembly Elections 2021: Does a ‘Party Society’ Really Subsume the Politics of ‘Identity’ and ‘Development’?
While West Bengal’s “exceptionalism” is often touted to explain the claimed lack of communal and caste-based politics in the state, the rise of populist forces has somehow managed to take advantage of identitarian fault lines without creating space for democratic political mobilisation of marginalised sections.
Elections for 294 seats of the West Bengal Legislative Assembly are scheduled to be held between 27 March and 29 April 2021 in eight phases.
The key political players in the upcoming elections include:
(i) The All India Trinamool Congress (TMC) and its allies, including the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha;