As poll time nears in Bengal, Mamata the ‘redeemer’ emerges again

As political parties in West Bengal gradually switch into election mode, Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee has once again donned the role of a “redeemer”, slamming her government and the party for inaction and corruption.

This is a trend Mamata has been following ahead of elections as a calculated move to not only insulate herself from the blemishes of her government and party, but also to blunt the Opposition’s barbs.

Sandeshkhali damage control

We saw Mamata assume this role in the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections earlier this year too, when allegations of land grabbing and sexual assault against some local TMC leaders in Sandeshkhali threatened to turn into a major issue. Mamata unhesitatingly criticised her party leaders.

“Those involved in the wrongdoings will not be spared. I have never allowed and will never allow any injustice to anyone,” she announced without trying to be defensive. She warned her party functionaries against depriving people of their rights.

The subsequent election results showed that people actually believed that she would fix their woes. They overwhelmingly reposed their faith in her leadership.

Also read: West Bengal | How Mamata Banerjee’s blend of saffron politics has outfoxed BJP

Battling “cut money” in 2021

Before that, in 2021, it was Mamata who had introduced the word “cut money” in the state’s political lexicon to accuse some of her party leaders of taking bribes from beneficiaries of government schemes.

That was just when the TMC was gearing up for the assembly polls, recouping from its not-so-impressive performance in the 2019 general elections.

While the opposition tried to project her remark as an admission of corruption, she turned the tables on them by indicating that it was she who was fighting against the menace by exposing it.

Blunting the Saradha-Narada sting

That’s not all. Mamata had done this in 2016 too. In the wake of corruption charges over the Saradha scam and the Narada sting, Mamata had countered the Opposition onslaught in the Assembly elections with a passionate appeal to the electorate.

“I am the candidate in all 294 seats; cast your votes for me,” she famously said.

And the voters obliged. The TMC stormed back to power with a larger mandate than 2011, winning 211 seats, 27 more than its previous tally.

Also read: Bypoll sweep | TMC on fast-track for Assembly elections while Oppn gapes

Mamata the crusader

“The message is very clear: Mamata is the crusader and not the upholder of corruption and other wrongdoings many of her party leaders are embroiled in,” noted author and political commentator Ashok Sengupta.

To her credit, Mamata, by fashioning herself as a political ascetic, has been able to convince the electorate about her personal integrity despite charges of corruption against her party members and even some of her family members.

Last month, she came down heavily on a certain section of government officials, alleging that “lower-level officers, workers, and some police officers take bribes” and facilitate the smuggling of sand and coal, and cement theft.

A “victim” in RG Kar case

Notably, in the RG Kar hospital rape-murder case, when the police and health officials came in the eye of the storm, Mamata played the victim and wondered why she and other political leaders would have to take the blame for the transgressions of certain officials.

Not too long ago, she had accused TMC-run civic bodies of rampant illegal construction and poor cleanliness, stating that her government should not get a bad name for their inactions and illegal work. Her senior party colleagues, including Cabinet ministers, bureaucrats, and police officials, were subjected to a tongue-lashing in an administrative meeting.

Earlier this month, a TMC leader from Murshidabad district, Mithu Sheikh, was arrested on charges of killing a person who had demanded that the money he had allegedly paid Sheikh for the inclusion of his name in the list of beneficiaries of a state government-run housing scheme be returned.

Also read: Is Mamata BJP’s new Naveen Patnaik? Bengal Governor-CM bonhomie indicates so

TMC course-correction a distant dream

These incidents are not aberrations. Many such events often come to the fore from the districts, showing that course-correction in the TMC is still a distant dream.

In October, two TMC factions in South 24-Parganas district got into violent clashes over allegations of corruption soon after the government announced the list of beneficiaries in a state housing scheme.

The Sundarbans Development Minister and local MLA, Bankim Chandra Hazra, was accused of corruption in compiling the beneficiary lists, resulting in the clash.

Wait for justice

In yet another incident, a landless farmer from Purba Mukundapur in East Midnapore district, in a viral video, accused a TMC leader from the district, Tarun Kumar Jana, of usurping the land his family was cultivating for over four decades.

The farmer, Swapan Maiti, claimed that his family had been trying to get the plot registered for decades. But to his utter surprise, he came to know recently that the land has been issued in the name of the TMC leader’s mother, who is not a farmer.

“I brought the matter to even the chief minister’s notice. I am waiting for justice,” Maiti told The Federal.

The TMC leader could not be contacted for comment.