A palmyra-palm tree stands left of centre outside the home of Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and his wife Mira in Ballygunge's Palm Avenue.

Four CPM flags are tied to the tree but there is no wind to make them flutter, almost echoing the lack of buzz on the street that was once the hub of activity when Bhattacharjee, Bengal CPM's tallest leader after Jyoti Basu, was the chief minster.

The silence felt even more overwhelming on Saturday because the area, part of Kolkata Dakshin constituency, voted to elect its MP.

Barely 30 metres from the residence of the Bhattacharjees, four youths sat at a TMC camp. A TMC flag, the only one on a 50-metre Palm Avenue stretch, was tied to the umbrella to announce its political affiliation.

As this correspondent approached the camp and barely said "Buddhadeb...", a young Trinamool worker stood up and asked: "Unar bari (his house)?" He pointed at the palm tree and continued: "Oi taal gachher bna hather flat (the flat on the left of the palm tree)."

Outside the residence of the 81-year-old former CM, a man reclines on a bench at a makeshift kiosk.

"He is indisposed and doesn't step out," the man said.

Near the Palm Avenue and Broad Street crossing and about 100 metres from the former CM's home, a group of eight to nine CPM supporters sat at a camp decked with party flags.

Abhijit Das, who was managing the camp, said: "Buddha babu went to the Patha Bhavan polling station to vote in 2016. That was the last time we saw him. This morning his wife Mira Bhattacharjee and their son Suchetan went to vote. He doesn't leave home."

Das attributed the silence to the peaceful nature of the area.

"There is no political conflict here. Most people have voted and gone home. When Buddha babu was active, journalists, police, leaders used to create a buzz. His security protocol required the presence of cops. All that doesn't happen now," Das said.

The CPM's Dakshin Kolkata candidate Saira Shah Halim said she met "Buddha babu" after filing her nomination papers. "He blessed me and said, 'Pass your exam with flying colours'," Saira told The Telegraph.

This silence was in sharp contrast to the decibels around chief minister Mamata Banerjee's Harish Chatterjee Street home. It loudly proclaimed the state's power centre.