Beleaguered Mamata Banerjee gets a lifeline from BJP

As a shrewd politician, Mamata knows when she is winning or losing.

Its advantage Mamata Banerjee after two days of mayhem and mob rule in Kolkata and elsewhere in West Bengal during the Bharatiya Janata Party’s 12-hour general strike on Wednesday, and the “Nabanna (headquarters of the state government) March” the day before by the Chattra Samaj. This is a newly-floated outfit whose leaders openly admitted their links with RSS-BJP before going on the warpath.

Popular Anger Directed at Trinamool But…

Although the vast majority of ordinary Bengalis are very angry and upset with the Trinamool Congress government for mishandling the brutal rape and murder of the 31 year old woman doctor in the R G Kar Hospital on August 9, it seems that the violence unleashed on the streets on successive days to evict Mamata from power has completely alienated them from the BJP. Their revulsion is bound to result in TMC candidates defeating BJP candidates by even bigger margins in the six upcoming assembly by-elections than anticipated earlier.

Two sisters who witnessed the police battling the lumpen on Tuesday from a bus caught in the crossfire, told me how they squirmed with embarrassment as the hooligans hurled the choicest abuse at the mothers and sisters of the men in uniform, who were remarkably restrained despite the provocation. The outraged duo said that instead of political slogans, the law-breakers armed with sticks and stones, were shouting filthy abuse denigrating women, revealing their mindset.

BJP Forfeits Goodwill

Going by their narrative, the BJP has clearly forfeited a lot of goodwill trying to capitalize on the woman doctor’s rape and murder to pull down Mamata and impose President’s Rule in West Bengal, where voters tilted in favour of the Trinamool Congress in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. BJP’s tally in the election declined to 12 from 18 seats it won in 2019.

In a related development, President Droupadi Murmu on Wednesday flagged the rape-murder of the Kolkata woman doctor during an interview she gave the Press Trust of India. But her vehement criticism is also to Mamata’s advantage as the country’s highest constitutional authority singled out West Bengal; she didn’t say a word about recent crimes committed against women in BJP-ruled states like Maharashtra, Uttarakhand, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.

TMC Gains Some Control of Narrative

A TMC spokesman, Kunal Ghosh, lost no time in pointing out that the BJP-appointed President is behaving no differently from another BJP-appointed constitutional figure, West Bengal Governor C. V. Ananda Bose, who instead of condemning the Chhatra Samaj’s depredations, publicly proclaimed on Tuesday that “it is the beginning of the end” of Mamata rule.

Studies have shown that such remarks invariably end up generating sympathy for Mamata and the TMC among the masses and work against the BJP’s immediate, medium or long-term interests and prospects in a state where Delhi is viewed as an adversary which must be repulsed at any cost

As a shrewd politician, Mamata knows when she is winning or losing. Realising that she is again on a good wicket because of the BJP’s missteps, she announced yesterday that she will pass a law in the West Bengal assembly in the next ten days to ensure capital punishment for rapists.  She obviously thinks that the piece of legislation will satisfy her voters who are very dissatisfied with her handling of the Kolkata woman doctor’s rape-murder and are refusing to stop demanding justice for her. But I doubt if it will work. Some heads have to roll to assuage her sulking vote bank.

Ominous Remarks

And to put the BJP in place after two days of mayhem, Mamata yesterday declared that her slogan badal chai, badla chai na -- we want change, not revenge – needs to be revised. She ominously declared that her supporters and followers are free to do what they think is right in today’s circumstances. Her advice to “bark or hiss even if you don’t bite” has alarmed BJP state chief Sukanta Majumder sufficiently to dash off a letter to Amit Shah accusing Mamata of inciting her boys to thrash BJP men and women.

Isolated BJP

Importantly, the BJP’s adventurism has isolated it with other opposition parties refusing to have any truck with it. Notably, when the Socialist Unity Centre of India (Communist), or SUCI, gave a call for a bandh on August 16, BJP immediately and wholeheartedly endorsed it. But SUCI did not return the favour when BJP gave the bandh call. The SUCI said that it neither supports nor opposes the bandh, adding that it wouldn’t have hesitated to support it if the BJP had also protested against rape and murder of women in states like Uttar Pradesh.

Similarly, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and the Congress Party have slammed the BJP for weaponising the Chhatra Samaj and highlighted Chhatra Samaj’s links with RSS-BJP leaders and legislators. But the West Bengal BJP is undeterred by all the criticism. It has announced a week-long schedule of dharnas in consultation with the central leadership. But as things stand today, if there is any violence in the coming days, the BJP will be the loser and TMC the gainer.