MAMATA BANERJEE’S LANDSLIDE
VICTORY IN BENGAL
Thursday’s (18th May,2016)poll outcome
reflected that there was no impact of either the Sharada-Narada scams or the
Vivekananda flyover collapse just on the eve of the polls.In a
stinging rebuff to rivals Left and Congress who had united against her, Mamata Banerjee scripted history
Thursday when she returned to power with a record win in elections to the West
Bengal assembly.
Her Trinamool Congress captured over 210 seats
in a House of 294, the landslide for a single party bettering the performance
of Siddhartha Shankar Ray of the Congress four decades ago.
The rout hurt the CPM more because the number
of seats it could manage was less than that of partner Congress.Banerjee, who
is going to be elected chief of the Trinamool Congress legislature party
Friday, said she will take oath of office on May 27 and her new government
should be in place by May 29.Seeking a second term after ending 34 years of
Left rule in the state in 2011, she kept the 2016 campaign focus on development
and social welfare initiatives of her government, listing among others rice for
Rs 2 a kilo, distribution of cycles, healthcare, roads and connectivit
The extent of her victory also suggested that
the Sharada-Narada scandals or the collapse of the Vivekananda flyover in
Kolkata, on the eve of the elections, had no impact. The Trinamool Congress
took all 11 seats in Kolkata including Jorasanko, the constituency where the
flyover collapsed. BJP’s Rahul Sinha, after taking an early lead in Jorasanko,
eventually lost to Smita Baxi of Trinamool Congress. READ | On historic high,
Mamata Banerjee recalls ‘historic low’ of Opposition ‘lies’ Preliminary reports
say the Trinamool Congress vote share is over 47 per cent, up almost 7 per cent
from 2011 when it teamed up with Congress to dislodge the Left. The Trinamool
Congress had then won 184 seats and the alliance 226 — but that partnership
ended when Banerjee walked out of UPA II. The vote share of the Congress-CPM
alliance is said to be 37 per cent. For the BJP, it is over 10 per cent, down
from 17.5 per cent of the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, but up from 6.5 per cent of
the 2013 panchayat and local body polls
Prof. John Kurakar
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