Bypassing the Congress, will Mamata Didi be the face of the Prime Ministerial candidate in the 2024 LS polls?

@vivekbhavsar

New Delhi: At a time when opposition parties are trying to forge an anti-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) front, Bengal tigress Mamata Banerjee, chief of Trinamool Congress (TMC) has chosen an independent way to project herself as the Prime Ministerial Candidate in 2024 Lok Sabha polls. The question is whether Mamata Didi – the chief of a regional party will succeed in countering Narendra Modi and by bypassing the Congress which has a pan India presence?

Mamata Didi’s meeting with Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) president Sharad Pawar and with Aaditya Thackeray, Shiv Sena’s youth leader and Environment minister raised eyebrows in the political circles of not just Maharashtra, but at the national level as well. 

In her Mumbai visit, Mamta Banerjee met NCP chief Sharad Pawar, Aaditya Thackeray and Sanjay Raut of Shiv Sena, but avoided meeting any leader of Maharashtra Congress.

After Pawar’s meeting, Mamata Banerjee insisted that all non-BJP parties should form a forum to counter Modi. She alleged that the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) is not there in existence now and without naming Rahul Gandhi, she said you can’t be abroad most of the time. 

Nana Patole, President of Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee (MPCC) and Ashok Chavan, former PCC president criticised Mamata Banerjee for her statement against UPA and Rahul Gandhi.

Sanjay Dutt, Congress in Charge of Himachal Pradesh said, “If there is one party which has been fighting fascist forces and standing up for the people of India, it is only the Congress-led by our leaders Sonia Ji and Rahul Gandhi Ji.”

Dutt further said that other party leaders who are now posturing to do so are fighting for ‘chair’ (power) and have allied with them in the past has no right to speak against Congress leaders.

“If any other party leader will make any baseless, sarcastic and malafide comments about our leader Rahul Ji, we will give a befitting reply and show them the mirror of their past stance and statements,” said Dutt.

According to a political observer, Mamta Banerjee’s TMC was the part of NDA during the late Atal Behari Vajpayee’s government and she was the minister for Railways in the Union Cabinet. She had friendly relations with the BJP until the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. She started opposing BJP only after the saffron party started making inroads in West Bengal.

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“If one recalls, the recent state assembly polls in West Bengal, Mamata Banerjee contested the poll on the line ‘states own party (TMC) against the outsider (BJP)’. If BJP, which has a national presence, could be an outside party for Didi, then on the same rule, TMC will be an outsider in Goa, Assam, Punjab and Haryana,” the observer pointed out.

TMC is venturing into states where it has no unit or organisational set-up of any kind. Its presence in Goa will be for state assembly elections only and after polls, Mamata will not visit the poll-bound state in the next five years,” claimed the observer.

According to Adv Vinod Tiwari, another political analyst, Narendra Modi’s strategy to boost regional parties to break off the political existence of Congress. “In South Indian states like Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and even in Kerala, BJP is planning to boost regional parties which can be used against Congress in that state to finish off its grassroots at the ground level. In Kerala, BJP is indirectly assisting the left party (CPI-M) which is in power in Kerala and as the left front is anti-Congress,” claimed Adv Tiwari.

“In Uttar Pradesh, BJP is promoting Samajwadi Party in such a way that the Congress will lose all its presence in UP. The same strategy will be played in Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Odisha, Punjab, Bihar, Jammu and Kashmir and other states by the BJP to ensure, after 2024 Lok Sabha polls, Congress will never be in the position to claim as an opposition party in the Lower House of the Parliament,” said Adv Tiwari.

A Congress insider claims that Mamta is eying on the PM post with the support of all anti-BJP parties across the nation. “It May happen but only after the backing of Congress. In the past, non-Congress PMs like Chandrashekhar, H D Deve Gowda and Inder Kumar Gujral enjoyed Prime Ministership with the backing of Congress only – though it was for a few months. If Mamata wants to become PM, she will require the support of Congress.

The Congress insider claims that contesting polls in the state where TMC has no unit presence, Mamata will split the anti-BJP votes which eventually help BJP candidates. The same thing will happen in Goa, Punjab and Haryana.

Adv Tiwari seconded this theory and said that defeating Congress with the help of regional parties such as TMC, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is the only agenda of BJP.

Madhav Bhandari, BJP leader did not endorse this claim. “Earlier the BJP was blamed for using Asaduddin Owaisi’s All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) in the election against Congress. Media also blamed the BJP for utilizing the Samajwadi Party (SP):in North Indian states or Prakash Ambedkar led Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) and Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) against Congress or Shiv Sena. But these claims are unsubstantiated,” said Bhandari.

He also refuted claims about using TMC against Congress. “Congress is a leaderless party and Rahul Gandhi and even Sonia Gandhi have failed to run the party,” said Bhandari.

Surprisingly, TMC’s mouthpiece in West Bengal – Jagori Bangla’ has opined in its September edition this year that ‘Rahul Gandhi got the opportunity on many occasions but failed to provide the alternative to PM Narendra Modi. The alternative coalition will be made with the Congress, but in the campaign, there should be a strong face, and that face is Mamata Banerjee, Didi should take that space.

Interestingly, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) has stopped probing against TMC MP Abhishek Banerjee who is the nephew of Mamata Banerjee in a money laundering case after Didi met PM Modi on November 24 in a closed-door for an hour. Were there any negotiations formulated between the two leaders? Was there any strategy discussed on how to make Congress-Mukta Bharat with the help of the TMC? These are the questions whose answers one may get in the future.

Meanwhile, Mamata has started poaching disgruntled Congress leaders who were once close to Rahul Gandhi. Sushmita Dev from Assam, Mausam Benazir Noor, Mahua Moitra left the party. Former Congress MP and former cricketer Kirti Azad, former MP Ashok Tanwar from Haryana leaves the Congress and showed faith with Mamata Banerjee, are some examples of unrest within the Congress against Rahul Gandhi’s working style. 

Optimistic Mamata poached these leaders, offered Rajya Sabha seats to some of them like Sushmita Dev, who was President of All India Mahila Congress before switching to TMC and elected as RS member from West Bengal in August this year. 

Like Sushmita, Luizinho Faleiro, former Goa Chief minister along with 9 other leaders joined TMC on September 29. He was also nominated to Rajya Sabha by the TMC in November. Former Chief Minister of Meghalaya chief minister Mukul Sangma along with other leaders also recently switched to TMC from Congress.

Madhav Bhandari argued on why so many Congress leaders joined TMC in recent times. He said that a fraction in Congress, mostly senior leaders, have noticed that the Congress ideology is reflected in the TMC. For them, the Nehruvian ideology of socialism could last only in TMC only. 

“Mamata appeals to the Muslims and allows mosques to continue to remain open during lockdown whereas she restrains Hindu temples from opening again. She is different from Rahul Gandhi who shows Hindutva by visiting temples. This dual ideology of Rahul is difficult to absorb for old Congressmen. That is why they are switching to TMC.

Contradicting this opinion, Sanjay Dutt of Congress claimed that the leaders who do not have supporters and who can’t win the election through the ballot, are joining TMC and reaching Parliament through the backdoor.  

Congress’s role is like an engine of the train. The train can move only if led by an engine and not by one bogie. It is the engine that binds all bogies together and pulls them in the right direction, said Dutt.