The BJP has drastically narrowed the gap with Trinamool Congress in the Bhabanipur segment, represented by chief minister Mamata Banerjee in the Assembly, by over 50,000 votes in this general election for the Kolkata Dakshin seat.
Trinamool's lead in this Assembly segment was a mere 8,297 votes.
Booth-wise data from the Election Commission of India reveals that the BJP led from 149 of the 269 booths in the Assembly segment, and five of the eight Kolkata Municipal Corporation wards under the Assembly segment.
In the September 2021 bypolls, Mamata won the Bhabanipur Assembly seat by a record margin of 58,832 votes, securing nearly 72 per cent of the vote share. Mamata had led in all eight wards.
The five wards the BJP leads in are 63 (parts of Chowringhee, Taltala, Park Street, Shakespeare Sarani, the Maidan and Hastings), 70 (Jadu Babu’s Bazaar), 71 (Bhowanipore), 72 (Chakraberia, Padmapukur, and Bakulbagan), and 74 (Alipore). They are five of the 45 from the city’s 144 wards — spread over several Lok Sabha seats — in which the BJP secured leads this time, skyrocketing from the three wards that it won in the civic polls of 2021.
The three Trinamool-led wards of the diverse, cosmopolitan constituency are 73 (parts of Bhowanipore, Patuapara and Kalighat), 77 (parts of Kidderpore), and 82 (Chetla). Incidentally, 73 is represented in the Corporation by Mamata’s sister-in-law Kajari Banerjee, while 82 is the ward of mayor and urban development minister Firhad Hakim.
“Anything to do with Bhabanipur and Kolkata Dakshin is a matter of prestige for us. Both are home to Didi (Mamata) and (her heir-apparent) Abhishek (Banerjee). She has been the Bhabanipur MLA since 2011, and was a six-term Kolkata Dakshin MP since 1991,” said one of Trinamool’s Kolkata Dakshin backroom boys, who admitted to being astounded by the Bhabanipur results.
“We will surely turn this around by the next Assembly election. But this was a damper,” he added.
Bhabanipur and Rashbehari — represented in the Assembly by Trinamool’s south Calcutta organisational district unit chief Debasish Kumar — are two of the Assembly segments in Kolkata Dakshin (the other five being Ballygunge, Behala Purba, Behala Paschim, Kolkata Port, and Kasba) in which Mamata’s party finds itself trailing to the BJP this time, despite having won all seven in 2021.
Overall, Trinamool’s lead in Assembly segments went down to 192 this general election, from 215 in 2021, and that of the BJP went up to 90 from 77. This is in stark contrast to the final Lok Sabha outcome, in which Trinamool bagged 29 seats, including all five in and around Calcutta, compared to the BJP’s 12.
“This is a statewide trend. In all urban, semi-urban, peri-urban centres, voters have reposed faith in Narendra Modi and his party.... Those who are better off and more aware tend to side with the BJP,” said the BJP’s Ward 50 councillor Sajal Ghosh.
This time, Trinamool’s incumbent MP Mala Roy received 62,461 votes from Bhabanipur, 20,802 less than the September 2021 bypoll. BJP candidate Debasree Chaudhuri nearly doubled the September 2021 tally, to secure 54,164.
Nearly one out of every two Bhabanipur electors is a non-Bengali. The constituency has large numbers of Punjabis, Gujaratis, Biharis, Marathis, Odiyas, Marwaris, and people from Uttar Pradesh, besides some from Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and Andhra Pradesh. The socio-economically diverse constituency has around 80 per cent non-Muslim votes, with Hindus, Sikhs, and Jains in large numbers.
“A chunk of non-Bengali, non-Muslim voters backed the BJP in the Lok Sabha election. This may not happen in the Assembly or civic polls,” said a political observer.
Trinamool leader Kunal Ghosh said the factors of the general election wouldn’t remain relevant in the civic or Assembly elections, and the party would regain dominance there.
