BENGALIS appreciate a closely-fought election as much as they do a good football match. But this year, with the Congress(I) still to put its act together, the odds appear to heavily favour the CPI(M)-led Left Front team for the March 23 Assembly clash.
The nomination process last fortnight was punctuated by allegations of blatant partisanship against state Congress(I) President Priya Ranjan Das Munshi. Over 3,000 prospective candidates submitted applications and a third of them were interviewed in Calcutta by a four-member All-India Congress Committee(I) team.
But most Congressmen dismissed the procedure as a farce. Das Munshi, backed by four lieutenants in the 11-member state election committee, reportedly pushed in about 170 candidates of his own choice into the 294-member Congress(I) poll list. The bulk of the remaining seats went to supporters of Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Ajit Panja and Union Law Minister Asoke Sen. Other party bigwigs secured barely half-a-dozen tickets each for their supporters.
The first to revolt were Congress(I) councillors of the Calcutta Municipal Corporation, who had learnt that Das Munshi did not intend giving tickets to any of them. They protested by voting against the party candidate for mayor's post and the Left Front candidate Kamal Basu-who had been forced to resign from the mayoral post due to the defection of a key councillor to the Congress(f) fold-was re-elected. Ultimately, Das Munshi had to nominate a few of them.
Many Congress(I) leaders claim that the chief reason for the growing indiscipline is the preferential treatment Das Munshi gives to his former Congress(S) cronies. Indeed, even a number of safe Congress(I) seats with sitting MUs have been transferred to them.
"It is going to be difficult to get our party machinery to start functioning again to catch the floating votes," admits the state organisational chief Subrata Mukherjee. As it is, the party is very far behind the Left Front in election cam-ptiigning. And with Das Munshi's obvious favouritism, several resentful party workers may well work against the official candidates.
Decisions like the dropping of veteran Congressman Rauf Ansari and the fact that the Congress(I) has fielded only 46 Muslim candidates-against the expected 60-will also put the party at a serious disadvantage with the Muslims who constitute more than 20 per cent of the state's population. Moreover, the Left Front is already suggesting that the Centre, despite passing the Muslim Personal Law Bill, is now trying to nullify it by initiating a debate on a uniform civil code. The collapse of faith in the party's state leadership therefore comes at a time when, according to Central intelligence agencies, there is swelling support for the Congress(l)in rural areas-for years considered a left preserve.
The Left Front's advantages are stiII its excellent organisation, composed of ideologically oriented cadres. Former finance minister Pranab Mukherjee's Rashtriya Samajbadi Congress, flooded with disgruntled Congressmen, could wreck the Congress(I)'s prospects, if it were to wean away even 5 per cent of its traditional votes.
On the debit side, the Left Front has a number of MLAs and ministers, whose arrogance and inaccessibility has alienated not merely left voters but lower-level party workers as well. But at least the Front, which had submitted its poll list way back in September last year, is prepared for the election match. If the Congress(I) can't get on with the game, it will receive as many brickbats as it will lose votes.