I write this column as a member and spokesperson of the Trinamool Congress and from this vantage position, I obviously have my beliefs and my biases. Nevertheless I do and will continue to offer analysis that I believe to be accurate, from the information available to me. I am entering that caveat because we are in election season. Two rounds of voting are over, and as I see it, the Trinamool Congress is headed for a comfortable majority in West Bengal.
In its heart, the CPI(M)-Congress alliance realises it doesn't have a ghost of a chance. It is faltering and groping, hanging on to one or two ideas given to it daily by its kept media operator. In the polling yesterday, Surjya Kanta Mishra, state secretary of the CPI(M) and the Chief Ministerial candidate of the opposition alliance, had a bad day in his own constituency. He has rarely visited the constituency in the past five years, spending his time in Kolkata. It was an open secret that he wanted to switch seats in 2016. For some reason he couldn't. On voting day, locals booed and jeered him from booth to booth. It was an extraordinary scene.
In the end, the difference boils down to one alluring intangible: mass popularity. The popularity of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and the Trinamool government is becoming more and more apparent. While there may be a few local concerns in individual constituencies, there is no major issue to cause a state-wide resentment or a pan-Bengal opposition. The Chief Minister is a genuinely liked and admired individual in the state. She is not the face of a bureaucratic and ideological cabal or nominated by a leadership in Delhi.
Fundamentally, both the CPI(M) and Congress have failed to understand this. Desperate for answers, they are, in a knee-jerk manner, complaining of violence and booth capturing and rigging. Their kept media operator is aiding them here. Yet, while doing this, the Communists can offer no real examples of allegedly Trinamool-inspired violence.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee during an election rally at Safanagar in South Dinajpur district of West Bengal (PTI Photo)
In fact, their own record in office and their own violent history and their own narrative of intolerance comes back to mock them. For as the venerable Jawaharlal Nehru once said, "The Communist Party's unfortunate association with violence encourages a certain evil tendency in human beings." People in West Bengal know and remember this only too well.
For 34 years (1977-2011), the Communists maintained their grip on West Bengal not through popularity but through scare tactics, harsh violence, an authoritarian control on the police and district bureaucracy, and by bribing Congress politicians. The CPI(M) has no concept of what popularity means. That explains its surprise at the goodwill and charisma, the enthusiasm and the optimism, that voters see in Mamata Banerjee.
What is noticeable is that the CPI(M) support base and workers who are out campaigning are generally ageing. Youth voters are almost uniformly not with the CPI(M), which has now become an outfit of yesterday's generation, both ideologically and demographically. This is their last chance to somehow trip up Trinamool. Otherwise they are looking at oblivion. As a result the CPI(M) is running a cynical and entirely negative campaign, with no story of hope to sell.
With the Congress as an also-ran and the BJP only concentrating on a blatantly communal rhetoric that thankfully has few takers in West Bengal, it is the Communists that remain the largest opposition. Even though I oppose them, I would have been happy, for the sake of our state, if the CPI(M) had undergone a change and a makeover and had promoted a more forward-looking agenda. Thankfully for Trinamool, the CPI(M) has done nothing of the sort and learnt no lessons from its humiliation in successive elections since 2009, including in the 2011 assembly elections.
While this is leaving Trinamool well poised, what is the future of the CPI(M), then? I am reminded of an old quote of Leon Trotsky's, used by him against his adversaries: "You are pitiful, isolated individuals. You are bankrupts; your role is played out. Go where you belong from now on - into the dustbin of history."
It sounds harsh, but on May 19, verdict day, will the common Bengali voter in effect be saying that to the CPI(M)?
Derek O'Brien is leader, Parliamentary party Trinamool Congress (RS), and Chief National spokesperson of the party.Disclaimer: The opinions expressed within this article are the personal opinions of the author. The facts and opinions appearing in the article do not reflect the views of NDTV and NDTV does not assume any responsibility or liability for the same.