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#Indian Elections #Modi #Congress
Follow Gulf News' for special coverage and analysis of the Indian Elections 2019.
#Indian Elections #Modi #Congress
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00:00Good afternoon and welcome back to yet another live update from Gulf News on the Indian elections
00:082019.
00:09Right now with me are Sanjeev and Chiranjeev and we are going to talk about one particular
00:16aspect of the Indian elections, which is the battle between Mamata Banerjee of Trinamool
00:23Congress of West Bengal and Prime Minister Modi, as in what has happened and especially
00:29the inroads that BJP has made in West Bengal, which used to be a stronghold for her.
00:37So starting off with you Sanjeev, what is happening in West Bengal right now and what
00:41does that mean for the ground?
00:44See, West Bengal has emerged as a fascinating story in these elections because BJP, I think
00:50even when they did very well in the state five years back in the 2014 general elections,
00:55they got 17% vote share and from 17% they are now hovering around 44%, which is a massive
01:02jump.
01:03And the interesting thing is BJP never had the kind of manpower or the organizational
01:08strength to translate support into votes, but that shift has taken place this time.
01:15And I think one man who has made quite a bit of difference to this is Mukul Roy, who shifted
01:20from, you know, he's changed, he shifted his allegiance from Trinamool to BJP.
01:24He was Mamata's right hand man, if you remember, like when Trinamool came to power in 2011,
01:30Mukul Roy had a very big role to play.
01:32But after that, things took a turn for the worse.
01:35Mamata's equations with Mukul turned sour because of Mukul's name having been involved
01:42in Ponzi scam.
01:44And thereafter Mukul left Trinamool and he joined BJP.
01:47And I think Mukul switching sides had a very big role to play in giving BJP the kind of
01:52ground support they needed in the hinterlands of Bengal.
01:56And that is reflective of what is happening in Bengal right now, with BJP looking set
02:01to win about 17 seats, unthinkable about even five months back.
02:05Yes.
02:06And there is also the CPM mix, right?
02:09Yes.
02:10I think the idea that earlier, you know, it was a fight between, let's say, the left front
02:16and Trinamool, especially when you take the assembly into consideration.
02:21That is gone.
02:22And I think the epitaph of the left has been written in Bengal.
02:25They haven't opened their account.
02:26There's not a single seat that they've won so far.
02:30So there were lots of stories earlier about how the left front unofficially was asking
02:36its voters to go and vote for the BJP so that they still saw Mamata as their prime enemy.
02:42She needed to be ousted.
02:43Unfortunately...
02:44Sorry to interrupt you.
02:45So you're saying, as you were discussing earlier, it's like a whisper campaign.
02:51Yes.
02:52That has succeeded against her.
02:53Unfortunately or fortunately, whatever, it has succeeded at the cost of the CPM, which
02:58has been, or the left front, which has been wiped out from Bengal.
03:02That is there.
03:03However, the other thing is, the kind of campaign that the BJP ran in Bengal is quite different
03:11from what it did in the rest of the country.
03:14So on one hand, there was, you know, a very, very disciplined approach, a Carter-based
03:18approach.
03:19But at the same time, there was also a lot of polarization, because if you see towards
03:23the constituencies that share the border with Bangladesh, you will see, for example, in
03:29North Malda, BJP has made major inroads, which was, you know, completely unthinkable.
03:36And like Sanjeev said, I think Mukul Roy has also made a major difference to this election
03:42in terms of having the know-how about what exactly goes inside the Trinamool camp.
03:49So in that sense, it was a strategy that took the fangs out of the Vamta campaign.
03:55And also, like you said, the border with Bangladesh.
03:58So is that the whole Bangladeshi issue, the NRC, all that having an impact?
04:04Yes.
04:05I think that...
04:06Because I think that has impacted Assam.
04:07It has.
04:08Yes.
04:09And it's also, you know, reflected in places like what we call the Jangal Mahal in the
04:15north, which were typically, you know, left and Trinamool bastions.
04:19This year, they have all gone to the BJP.
04:22So that is there.
04:23Sorry, just to interrupt again, again, is that a faith-based issue, or is it more to
04:29do with the fact that these people are taking away our jobs and our resources?
04:34I think it's more of a polarized politics that you see there.
04:39So it is, you know, the rhetoric, the kind of speeches, the kind of, you know, fanning
04:45the flames.
04:47So those things have had the results, it looks like.
04:50I think another important point which I would like to mention here is the consolidation
04:55of the tribal vote.
04:56If you look at the kind of seats BJP is winning in Bengal, they are almost winning Jharkhand,
05:01they are winning Purnia, and a couple of other states also in the western part of
05:05the state.
05:06Now, those are all tribal infested areas.
05:08I won't use the word infested, that's a wrong term to use.
05:12But there are places where BJP is doing well, where the tribals are in the majority.
05:16Now this is another emerging trend of this election.
05:18If you look at parts of Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, and West Bengal, this is
05:23an emerging trend where BJP seems to be doing very well among the tribal voters.
05:28In West Bengal, this has happened primarily because of the fact that the vast majority
05:32of tribal voters in the state still believe that it's the central government which is
05:36the primary vehicle for deliverance.
05:39Whether it be jobs, it be any other social scheme or whatever, they still consider that
05:43Modi can deliver the goods which Mamata can't.
05:47And I think that has played a big role in this election because BJP has capitalized
05:50on that sentiment quite a bit.
05:51So the fact that they're unhappy with her is what...
05:54Exactly.
05:55The fact is that she has been in power.
05:57She hasn't been able to do much for that area which is called Jungle Mahal, which is a tribal
06:02belt primarily, where the Maoists have always been a very big cause for concern.
06:08So because of various reasons, I think the tribal belt has consolidated behind the BJP,
06:12giving it the kind of mandate that has happened so far.
06:16Which brings us to Darjeeling and...
06:19That's the northern part of the state again.
06:20Now Darjeeling's politics is a bit different in the sense that there has been a lot of
06:24issues with the Gorkha movement in Darjeeling.
06:27And BJP also played its cards well, politically well, because they have always sided with
06:32the Gorkha movement, leaving Trinamool out, and making Trinamool look like an outsider
06:37in the hills.
06:38So that sentiment was there, and if you remember last time when SS Aluwalia won the Darjeeling
06:43seat, it was a close fight, but he pulled it off for BJP.
06:47And this time there has been a further consolidation of that same sentiment of people belonging
06:51to the hills, siding with the Taman group, and BJP siding with the Taman group and pulling
06:59it out of Trinamool's clutches.
07:01So the hill politics has also been quite fascinating, yeah, exactly.
07:06And the whole, I think, the argument over the Bengali language and the Bengali identity.
07:11Yeah, that has also played a role, for sure.
07:15However, if you look at, you know, the suburbs or the districts versus the state capital
07:20Kolkata, so there in Kolkata, at least in terms of number of seats, the BJP has not
07:26been able to make major inroads, except for Kolkata South, which is again, you know, where
07:32the, you know, which is Mamata's backyard, however, there Netaji Subhash Bose's great
07:41grandnephew is leading the charge again for the BJP, and this is a seat where, which Trinamool
07:49Congress has not lost in the last eight elections.
07:52This is basically the home turf of the Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, and if they lose
07:56from here, it's a major embarrassment for the party, even if they win.
08:01Which brings us to the other question, like you guys were mentioning earlier that she
08:07was kind of at the forefront, and many expected her to field her as a candidate for the Prime
08:13Minister's office.
08:14Yes.
08:15And so, it was Modi versus speed breaker, Didi versus expiry bump, or the Dhokla mafia.
08:22That's a nice way of putting it.
08:24That was the kind of language that we saw in the campaign, and you know, at one point
08:30of time, it looked like that Mamata was the sort of only very vocal part of the coalition,
08:37opposition coalition standing up against Modi, however, the mandate obviously has gone in
08:43the other way.
08:44No, again, what I'm trying to find out is when you speak to some of the grassroots workers,
08:49they talk about how happy they are with her and the things that she has done.
08:53So again, what you're seeing in West Bengal is a lot of factors together.
08:58Yeah.
08:59And so...
09:00Anupa, I'll just mention this, that there are people even now who will swear by Mamata.
09:05They'll still go out and, you know, close their eyes and vote for Trinamool.
09:09But the point is, in the last panchayat elections, which were held last year, 34% of the seats
09:15were...
09:16Like, they just went through the motions because there were no candidates.
09:19Trinamool candidates won unopposed in 34% of the seats.
09:23That's a very big number, actually.
09:25And the reason being, Trinamool had coerced and, you know, there was a fair bit of fear
09:29psychosis which were at play.
09:31As a result, the opposition parties couldn't put up candidates in those seats.
09:35But that hasn't gone down well for people in those areas.
09:38So apart from the fact that, you know, there's a fair bit of anti-incumbency against Mamata,
09:42this sentiment has also started setting in that, you know, we had voted the CPM out of
09:46power for the very reasons for which Trinamool is now being found guilty.
09:50So that factor has also played in.
09:52But just taking on from there, I think what we are seeing here is in terms of what's happening
09:58to the Parliament, to the Parliament segments.
10:01But if there was to be an election for the Assembly now, I think we will see quite a
10:06different kind of a picture.
10:07Okay.
10:08Like...
10:09Which you said is expected in 2021.
10:10Which is expected in 2021.
10:12However, with this kind of a mandate that the BJP has got in the state, I think it will
10:17be... possibly we will see elections in the state even before 2021.
10:25That's entirely possible.
10:28So what you're seeing in West Bengal is interesting again.
10:32And as to quote Mamata herself, all loss is not loss.
10:39And that hopefully she takes a lesson from this and does not repeat the past mistakes.
10:46And like you said, the voter is rather intelligent and does not want to be treated badly.
10:52But like I said, it's not over till all the counting is over.
10:56So let's wait for that.
10:58Yes.
10:59And thank you very much for joining us, Sanjeev and Chiranjeev, and for this analysis and
11:05providing this insight to our viewers, which reminds me, as before, let me remind you again
11:13that you can get all the updates on gulfnews.com.
11:17And you can also follow us on our social media channels, which is Facebook, Instagram and
11:21Twitter.
11:22Thank you very much for joining me.
11:24See you again in a short while.