A little over 200m is what separates chief minister Mamata Banerjee and her former confidante-turned-bete noire Suvendu Adhikary in Nandigram’s Reyapara. The residence where Mamata is staying on Wednesday night is on the same road linking Nandigram block-II with neighbouring Chandipur, where Adhikary has an election office.

On Wednesday evening, Adhikary wasn’t in at his Reyapara office. Those at the office without the mandatory protection against the novel Coronavirus could not care less. The battle they have in hand on Thursday could decide the fate for Bengal, though in the second phase polling will be held in 29 more Assembly seats.

Ever since the 2007 anti-land acquisition movement, which made Nandigram a household name across the length and breadth of the country, the land here has acquired a terrifying silence. Wednesday has been no different. From 2008 onwards, Nandigram has rejected the Left and stood firm with Trinamul in elections. Adhikary, BJP’s most prized catch this election, had received 66.79 per cent of the total votes in 2016. His nearest rival from the CPI had around 26.49 per cent, while the BJP then had a measly 5.32 per cent of the vote share.

In the Lok Sabha polls three years later, Trinamul’s vote share in the Nandigram Assembly segment of the Tamluk parliamentary seat was above 62 per cent, while the Left vote had shifted en masse to the BJP, which notched up a little less than 30 per cent. Some portion of the Trinamul vote too appeared to have gone to the BJP.

For Adhikary contesting on any party symbol a victory would have been assured, had it not been for his rival, the state chief minister who decided to contest against him. The Left has fielded a rookie Minakshi Mukherji, with support of the Congress and the Indian Secular Front, but that fight is likely for another day despite a very spirited campaign by the young politician.

The battle for Nandigram is between Mamata and Adhikary, where the Left may or may not get to play a role. The total number of voters in Nandigram is around 2.70lakh with around 62,000 Muslim voters.

For years since the 2007 movement, the Adhikary family have been running the show in the two adjoining Midnapores. What has happened this time in the district is reminiscent of the time when Mamata had floated the Trinamul Congress, and her immediate support base was so wide that in several places the Congress office signboards had to be changed. The leaders, the workers remained the same.

The 62,000 Muslim votes would have been assured for Mamata, though the Peerzada of Furfura Sharief, Abbas Siddiqui, the chief patron of the Indian Secular Front, a partner of the Left-Congress alliance, has campaigned here for Mukherji. The question remains how far can the Peerzada split the Muslim votes that could be a threat to Mamata.

The run up to the polls has been testimony to the bitter acrimony between the two rivals. Mamata addresses Adhikary as “Gaddar (traitor)”, while he reciprocates with the epithet “Begum” for the chief Minister, accusing her of Muslim appeasement.

“Muslim clerics never asked for allowance, she gave it on her own. She has been bribing the community to keep her vote bank intact. She is the aunt of Rohingyas and illegal immigrants,” Adhikary has repeatedly said.

On the other hand, Mamata has squarely blamed the Adhikary family for the March 14, 2007 violence in Nandigram when 14 villagers were killed in alleged police firing. That incident is seen as the turning point in Bengal’s politics that sounded the death knell for the CPM-led government.

Mamata’s claim that the police could not have entered Nandigram without a nod from the Adhikarys even when the Left was in power has raised questions why the chief minister had not broken her silence till now? Both Mamata and the Adhikarys owe their political power to the Nandigram movement.

On Wednesday, a number of Trinamul leaders complained about the presence of outsiders in the area to the election commission and the police. “In areas like Birulia our voters are being threatened by goons from the BJP,” said a local Trinamul leader.

Birulia bazaar is where Mamata had injured her leg on March 10 during the early days of the campaign and has been since moving around in a wheelchair with her leg plastered.

The BJP on the other hand complained that the Trinamul was bringing in outsiders via the river-route _ Nandigram is accessible from both Howrah and South 24-Parganas. Despite the complaints, there was hardly any movement by the central forces in the area.

No one in Nandigram seems to be willing to take any chances.

The Left which was left dangling with just 4.49 per cent votes too alleged to have received threats from both its rivals. “We have filed 1,717 complaints with the authorities,” said a CPM local committee member.

In the remaining 29 seats, BJP had emerged as the number two in most places (some Assembly segments like Kharagpur Sadar, Narayangarh, PIngla and Debra it led in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls). This time none of the seats would be an easy contest, but all eyes will be on Nandigram.

The authorities in Nandigram have imposed Section 144, prohibiting assembly of more than four people around 500metres from the booth from 6am on Thursday. Will that be enough in a high-pitched battle?