Four Reasons Why Mamata Banerjee’s Win In Bhabanipur Is Not The ‘Landslide Win’ It Is Being Loudly Touted As

Low voter turnout, serious allegations of electoral malpractices and the BJP's own faults take the sheen away from Mamata Banerjee's victory in the Bhabanipur bypoll.

Besides, a close look at the numbers reveals that out of the 58,000 margin, most of the lead came from the wards dominated by Muslims. This suggests that the sitting CM doesn't have uniform support across communities.

Media outlets, including television channels and the digital media, were effusive in describing Trinamool supremo Mamata Banerjee’s victory from Bhabanipur in the bypolls.

Adjectives like ‘spectacular’, ‘stunning’, ‘magnificent’ and ‘landslide’ have been lavished on the win by media outlets, most of whom gave up all pretensions of impartiality to unabashedly celebrate and revel in Banerjee’s win.

But a closer examination will reveal that the victory was far from spectacular, and does not definitely deserve the exultant attributes that were bestowed on it. The reasons why the victory is far from spectacular are:

One, low voter turnout: The fervent appeals by the Trinamool chief and senior leaders of the party to the voters of Bhabanipur to vote in large numbers were ignored by as much as 43 per cent of the constituency’s 2.07 lakh voters.

That, in itself, was an embarrassing snub by Bhabanipur’s electorate to Mamata Banerjee. She has, in all her election meetings, pleaded with the electorate to brave the vagaries of weather and vote in large numbers. Banerjee had told voters, especially the Muslims who form 20 percent of Bhabanipur’s electorate, that she would not be able to continue as chief minister if every single one of them does not vote (read this). “I will no longer be the CM if I do not win this election. Someone else will become CM. So each one of you should vote if you want me to continue being your CM,” she said.

“Don’t think Didi will win easily and there is no compulsion to vote. It may cost me dearly even if one of you does not vote. There should be 100 per cent polling this time,” she added.

She repeated this entreaty at every campaign meeting. The galaxy of senior Trinamool leaders who were deployed to manage her campaign also repeated this appeal everywhere, and even during their door-to-door campaigns.

But while the Muslims who are concentrated in two of the eight municipal wards of Bhabanipur Assembly seat did vote in large numbers, the remaining 80 per cent largely ignored the plea made by Banerjee and her senior colleagues.

“Everyone in Bhabanipur knew that the bypoll was a prestige battle for Mamata Banerjee and she needed to post a spectacular win from there. But the fact that a very large section of the electorate ignored her appeal to vote in large numbers is a poor reflection on her. She is, after all, the chief minister of the state and had she been as popular in Bhabanipur as is being made out, then voters cutting across community and linguistic lines would have heeded her appeal and come out in large numbers to vote. They did not, and that is a firm indication of voter disaffection,” said political analyst Tanmoy Bhattacharya.

What is more, Bhabanipur is where Mamata Banerjee lives, where she has grown up. It reflects quite poorly on her if 43 per cent of the people in her turf, and her neighbourhood, chose to ignore her appeal to vote in huge numbers.

Two, Mamata Banerjee’s support base remains Muslims: Banerjee defeated the BJP’s Priyanka Tiberwal by 58,835 votes. Banerjee polled 85,263 votes (71.9 per cent of the votes cast) while Tiberwal got 26,428 votes (22.2 per cent). But just two wards--the overwhelmingly Muslim-majority ward 77 (Ekbalpore-Khidderpore area) and ward 82 (Chetla-Gopalnagar) gave her a lead of 34,790 votes.

The remaining six wards which are dominated by Hindus and Sikhs gave her a lead of 24,045 votes. Thus, nearly 60 per cent of Banerjee’s victory margin can be attributed to Muslims, who form just 20 per cent of Bhabanipur’s electorate while only 40 per cent of her victory margin should be attributed to the majority 80 per cent of the electorate.

That is quite a setback for Mamata Banerjee and punctures her claims that she enjoys popularity amongst all sections of the electorate.

During the campaign, Banerjee proudly proclaimed that Bhabanipur was a ‘mini-India’ with the electorate comprising Muslims (20 per cent), Bengali Hindus (about 34 per cent) and non-Bengali Hindus and Sikhs (about 46 per cent).

“Hindus happily coexist at Bhabanipur with Muslims and Sikhs. Bengalis live and celebrate life along with Punjabis, Gujaratis, Marwaris, Odiyas and people from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. This is a microcosm of India,” Banerjee had been asserting.

The allusion to Bhabanipur being a microcosm of India was a clever ploy to create a narrative that Mamata Banerjee’s support base is not limited mostly to Muslims and a section of Bengali Hindus as her critics repeatedly assert. This narrative was being crafted to project her as a politician whose appeal cuts across community and linguistic boundaries and, thereby, boost her chances of playing a critical role in national politics.

But a close examination of the poll statistics shows that Banerjee’s primary support base remains mostly Muslims and a section of Bengali Hindus. Non-Bengali Hindus did not vote for her in large numbers and most of them, in fact, avoided exercising their franchise. That reflects poorly on Mamata Banerjee.

A large number of non-Bengali Hindus chose to remain indoors and many even kept themselves away on polling day--they went away to visit relatives in other parts of the city or even on vacations--to avoid voting for Mamata Banerjee.

“Non-Bengali Hindus are mostly BJP supporters and they chose to stay away from the polling booths in order to avoid voting. Most of them are businessmen and traders and had they voted for the BJP, they would have had to face repercussions from Trinamool. Hence, they chose not to exercise their franchise out of the real fear of being targeted and victimised by Trinamool which has always been very vengeful,” said BJP poll manager Debangshu Mitra.

Three, electoral malpractices: Mamata Banerjee’s victory has been marred by serious allegations of electoral malpractices. During the campaign, the BJP candidate Priyanka Tibrewal and senior BJP leaders were barred from going around some parts of the constituency, especially areas around Mamata Banerjee’s residence.

BJP leaders and workers were allegedly attacked, and BJP supporters were threatened and warned against voting for the party of their choice. “A silent campaign of terror and intimidation was carried out by Trinamool goons and that resulted in a large number of voters either staying away or voting for Mamata Banerjee out of fear,” BJP candidate Priyanka Tibrewal told Swarajya.

Even on the day of polling, Trinamool’s poll machinery allegedly resorted to many malpractices and rigging. “I myself caught a few false voters but instead of arresting them, the police helped Trinamool functionaries rescue them. At least a hundred false votes were cast in each polling station,” said Tibrewal.

All complaints filed by the BJP about malpractices were, said BJP leaders, perfunctorily dismissed by election authorities. The BJP has accused the election authorities of playing a partisan role.

Four, BJP’s own shortcomings: The BJP is organisationally weak in Bhabanipur and, in fact, in entire southern Bengal. Not only does the saffron party have very few workers in that constituency, it could not even get enough people to man the polling booths.

Tibrewal alluded to this: “An election is not won or lost by just the candidate or a leader of the party. It is the workers who play a crucial role in the poll campaign, in mobilising voters and instilling confidence in them, and also in ensuring that the rival party does not indulge in rigging. Our organisation was very weak in Bhabanipur and we have to work hard on that”.

According to a section of BJP leaders, the party also erred in nominating Tibrewal. “A Bengali Hindu should have been given the party ticket instead of Priyanka Tibrewal, who is a non-Bengali. Trinamool played the ‘Bengali’ card successfully this time too and campaigned among Bengali Hindus that the BJP was a non-Bengali party,” said a senior BJP leader who did not want to be named.

He pointed out that some old videos of Tibrewal speaking disparagingly about “fish-eating Bengalis” were circulated by Trinamool workers and that created a negative impact among Bengali Hindus.

“Many Bengali Hindus, who form about 34 per cent of the electorate, either voted against the BJP because we had fielded a non-Bengali candidate, or abstained from voting in protest against our candidate selection. A large percentage of the Bengali Hindu votes that Mamata Banerjee got were actually negative votes against the BJP and not positive votes in her favour,” asserted the BJP leader. ‘

“It is very anguishing that our party leadership has not learnt from the terrible blunders made in the Assembly polls earlier this year. The predominance of non-Bengali campaigners and the manner in which ‘outsiders’ (BJP leaders from other states) hogged the limelight resulted in our party being painted as a party of non-Bengalis and that propelled the Trinamool to a huge victory,” he added.

The argument among these BJP leaders is that the non-Bengali Hindus who are BJP supporters would have voted for the party anyway, irrespective of who had been fielded as the BJP candidate. But Bengali Hindus who are BJP supporters did not like the ticket being given to a non-Bengali, and so voted against the BJP or stayed away from voting.

“Fielding a Bengali Hindu bhadralok (gentleman) or bhadramahila (lady) would have helped us get the votes of our Bengali Hindu supporters and Mamata Banerjee’s victory margin would have come down significantly,” said another BJP leader who stays in neighbouring Rashbehari. “Bhabanipur is in south Kolkata, an area that is culturally dominated by Bengali Hindus. Fielding a non-Bengali from a south Kolkata constituency was not wise at all,” he added.

Considering all these factors, then, Mamata Banerjee’s victory by more than 58,000 votes is not spectacular at all. At the end of the day, the Trinamool stands accused of resorting to electoral malpractices, the state administration and the election authorities of having played a partisan role and Banerjee winning largely because of the support of her Muslim vote bank. And, of course, the BJP’s own shortcomings contributed significantly to Banerjee’s win.