Trinamul’s Gautam Deb and CPM’s Asok Bhattacharya, two prominent political faces of north Bengal, had a busy Sunday.

State tourism minister Deb played the development card to drum up support for Trinamul, while Siliguri MLA Bhattacharya reached out to his voters with a weeklong public interaction campaign.

In the morning, Deb went near the Bengal Safari Park on Siliguri outskirts and laid the foundation stone of “Karma Tirtha”, a proposed two-storey building that will have 10 stalls where local handicraft and other items would be displayed for sale by the self-help groups.

For this building, the state will spend Rs 81 lakh .

“Every day, Safari Park gets visitors by hundreds. Karma Tirtha will provide visitors an opportunity to buy local handicraft and other items and it will help self-help groups run by women,” said Deb.

Tourism minister Deb also distributed land rights to 67 residents of Dabgram-Fulbari, his Assembly constituency.

On his part, Bhattacharya, along with a group of CPM workers, visited a number of wards of the Siliguri Municipal Corporation (SMC), met people to know their grievances and expectations from the civic body as he chairs the board of administrators at the SMC, and also handed over leaflets comprising the issues that the CPM wants to flag ahead of the Bengal Assembly elections.

“We will continue the drive for seven days to know peoples’ opinion on various issues. Simultaneously, we will apprise them about our stand on the issues and ask for their support,” the senior CPM leader said.

In north Bengal, Siliguri Assembly constituency, an important seat owing to its location, is one that Trinamul could win only once in 2011.

“On the whole, Trinamul has failed to win seats in Lok Sabha and Assembly elections in Darjeeling district. Even in local body polls, Trinamul could win only in Mirik Municipality so far while the Left won in back-to-back elections of local bodies in Siliguri sub-division in 2015. It is evident that the Left will put all efforts to retain the Assembly seat and also local bodies,” said an observer.