KOLKATA: With assembly polls still a few days away, the average party workers in Kolkata are already in election mode. Whether it is from the Trinamool Congress, the BJP or CPM, the booth-level workers have been set a number of tasks, several of them meant to collect information and influence voters on the ground.
“The city will go to polls after about 40 days, but this is the time to step up the mass contact. They will vote at the last phases of this election and there is a scope that they might take a last moment decision. It is important that we develop a rapport with them,” said a vote manager from Trinamool. Almost all major parties are depending on experts to guide them — from mapping areas which will need attention, state and national issues that need to be highlighted to even the localized agendas which will differ from a slum to a high-rise.
“Despite Covid situation and use of tech platform, the one-to one dialogues still count the most,” said Ratna Dutta, a CPM state committee member.
The first to have declared all candidates in Kolkata is Trinamool Congress. It has brought a few fresh faces and TMC is determined to reap the advantage of the fact that they have hit the campaign trail at the earliest. “We are attending the workers’ meeting where we are being repeatedly told to work hand-in-hand. We have been asked to visit each household at least thrice and converse with voters for their feedback. It will be crucial to frame our responses as polling nears,” said Ward 83 youth TMC president Debajyoti Basu.
But the TMC is going much beyond the mandatory booth meetings. Whatsapp groups have been created at the booth level for TMC. The WhatsApp coordinators of each booth have been clubbed into WhatsApp groups under each ward. A centrally constituted ‘Assembly WhatsApp group’, too, has been formed with ward coordinators.
At Behala West, even as the TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee is yet to release the manifesto, booth workers have reached out with a performance card of their candidate Partha Chatterjee, the education minister of Bengal. Besides reforms in education, it has highlighted all the “achievements” of Chatterjee as the MLA from 2001.
The CPM, said Dutta, has completed the booth level meetings. “There are several things unique to this election — from using parody songs to using photographs of candidates in festoons — we are trying to evolve with the times. The number of young candidates in fray is part of a conscious decision to change with the times,” said Dutta.
BJP workers are not losing sleep over the fact that names of candidates in key constituencies are still awaited. “There is still time and we have been in touch with voters throughout the year. We have been busy with ‘ratha yatras’. Now, we will organize chai-pe-charchas on instruction from party seniors. We have started wall graffiti because otherwise the opposition might leave no space for us. At Tollygunge and Behala East, we have started pasting postersWe are reaching out to people with the dream of Sonar Bangla,” said Palash Ranjan Sarkar, a party worker.