Kolkata:
Red-dominated West Bengal is seeing green. Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress has swept the by-elections, winning 7 of the 10 assembly seats up for grabs.
What makes this success even sweeter, for Didi, as she's known, is that arch-rival CPM hasn't won any. Speaking to NDTV, Mamata Banerjee said, "I am confident of the people. People want change, they want good governance." The point, lost on nobody, that these elections are a semi-final for the Assembly elections in 2011. Banerjee's goal of winning those and ending 34 years of CPM-led rule looks a little more real.
Here's why. The Trinamool Congress not only held its 5 seats, but wrested 2 more the CPM. The Forward Bloc got the sole seat for the Left. An independent backed by the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha, which wants a separate state in Darjeeling, snatched Kalchini from the Left. The Congress lost one of its seats and retained one.
Since last year, Mamata, allied with the Congress, has rapidly encroached on the Left bastion, first sweeping the elections to local bodies and then the Lok Sabha elections earlier this year.
So what's helped Mamata win so big? "The Lok Sabha situation is still prevailing. The call for change raised by the opponent party still exists," says Amitava Nanda, a former MP from the CPM.
The 10 by-poll seats decided on Tuesday don't even constitute 10 per cent of the 294-member West Bengal Assembly, says the Left. They are clearly keeping a stiff upper lip. But for the Red Front, the assembly elections scheduled for 2011 now seem uncomfortably close.
What makes this success even sweeter, for Didi, as she's known, is that arch-rival CPM hasn't won any. Speaking to NDTV, Mamata Banerjee said, "I am confident of the people. People want change, they want good governance." The point, lost on nobody, that these elections are a semi-final for the Assembly elections in 2011. Banerjee's goal of winning those and ending 34 years of CPM-led rule looks a little more real.
Here's why. The Trinamool Congress not only held its 5 seats, but wrested 2 more the CPM. The Forward Bloc got the sole seat for the Left. An independent backed by the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha, which wants a separate state in Darjeeling, snatched Kalchini from the Left. The Congress lost one of its seats and retained one.
Since last year, Mamata, allied with the Congress, has rapidly encroached on the Left bastion, first sweeping the elections to local bodies and then the Lok Sabha elections earlier this year.
So what's helped Mamata win so big? "The Lok Sabha situation is still prevailing. The call for change raised by the opponent party still exists," says Amitava Nanda, a former MP from the CPM.
The 10 by-poll seats decided on Tuesday don't even constitute 10 per cent of the 294-member West Bengal Assembly, says the Left. They are clearly keeping a stiff upper lip. But for the Red Front, the assembly elections scheduled for 2011 now seem uncomfortably close.
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