Kolkata: Mamata Banerjee has said it at least once before and she has said it now again - that West Bengal could see Assembly polls this year itself instead of May 2011. The basis of her conviction is the civic polls results. She is confident the Trinamool will sweep them.
"If you decide, I believe we won't have to wait for 2011 for Assembly election. Once CPM loses in this election, Assembly elections will be held in Bengal within three months...if I understand Delhi or Bengal politics at all even a little bit," the Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader has said.
But the Left is seeing a deep political plot in Mamata's call for early polls. It suspects the Trinamool plans to unleash post poll violence to try force the Centre to step in.
"If TMC wins, what does it mean? That they will renew the violence, the politics of violence and more killings. So violence, more killings, more dead bodies will help Mamata to show that there is utter failure of administration and lawlessness. So again the question of 356, said CPM leader Mohammad Salim.
Mamata's call for early polls has sent political temperatures soaring in Bengal and also sent Delhi a signal. The Congress and Trinamool have fallen out in Bengal but if UPA needs her, it may have to lend her demand for early polls in Bengal a sympathetic ear.