Under the merciless summer sun of Bankura, 165km from his comfort zone in south Calcutta, a 73-year-old has been toiling relentlessly for 12 — sometimes 14 — hours daily for two months to achieve the only electoral success that has eluded him in a political career spanning five decades.

Subrata Mukherjee, since his ascent to the Siddhartha Shankar Ray cabinet as a 25-year-old, has rarely had to look back in his long and chequered political journey in Bengal. This time, he is looking to make his presence felt in Delhi’s corridors of power.

“When Subratada said he wants to do this, I had no second thought. I only asked him to take care of his health. He is, beyond doubt, someone who has worked tirelessly for the people…. This place is also close to his heart. Let’s all help him take a shot at Delhi,” Trinamul Congress chief Mamata Banerjee said at a rally for Mukherjee in Bankura on Thursday.

“He really deserves it,” she added.

Since March 13, a day after his candidature was announced, Mukherjee has been entrenched in the lateritic landscape, unwilling to yield to the increasing threat of the BJP — proactive RSS coupled with advances made in the panchayat polls — while eliminating the possibility of a CPM comeback in the constituency from where he lost 10 years ago, as a Congress candidate backed by Trinamul.

“I am not in the habit of beating my own drum. But I have left no drum unbeaten this campaign season. Because I am also not in the habit of losing,” said the seasoned politician, referring to his playing of traditional drums in tribal belts, a feature of his reach-out initiatives.

In a bid to ensure he did not fall ill, his wife Chhandabani and sister Tanima virtually never let him out of sight in these two months. Along with a couple of close aides, the three have been crisscrossing the constituency with the mercury often pushing the 43°C mark.

“It’s a fairly simple contest this time. There is no Basudeb Acharia (the CPM veteran who defeated him in 2009). I am not a Congress candidate. The CPM’s Amiya Patra has virtually been out of politics for some time. The BJP’s Subhas Sarkar is new to politics. They will split non-Trinamul votes,” said Mukherjee.

“I have been telling people that if they are not satisfied with my work, they need not vote for me. Thirteen major projects of the state government, I have ensured they were implemented thoroughly in Bankura…. I don’t see much to worry about,” he shrugged, smiling.

Bringing Mukherjee, deemed her political mentor early in her career, to contest from Bankura is being hailed as Mamata’s masterstroke. Trinamul insiders said almost overnight it maximised chances of victory in a seat where actress-turned-politician Moon Moon Sen, despite her felling nine-term CPM stalwart Acharia there in 2014, had become unpopular.

Political scientists said had Sen been fielded again from Bankura, Trinamul was in danger of losing.

“The BJP made significant inroads. The CPM remains a force to reckon with and its candidate is being backed by the Congress. Even within Trinamul, there were factions and brewing discontent…. Mukherjee has put his party over and above all of that through his campaign,” said Biswanath Chakraborty, professor of political science at Rabindra Bharati University.

A Trinamul leader from Ranibandh, one of the seven Assembly segments of the seat, agreed.

“Bankura is all about Subratada now. That’s just how he is…. Even if Didi had not come to campaign here, it would not have mattered much,” he said.

Pulin Ghosh, a 61-year-old tea-stall owner from the constituency, said his own extended family with 13 voters had become unsure of voting for Trinamul, had Sen or someone like her been fielded again.

“But Subratababu is somewhat of an icon who has seen it all, done it all. Given his track record as an efficient administrator who never disappoints his constituency, Bankura would do well to send him to Parliament,” he added, vowing to ensure all 13 votes from the family go to Mukherjee.

Trinamul sources said it was her awareness of this pull of Mukherjee that got her to field him from Bankura, sending Sen away to Asansol. “This man is a 10-term MLA, three-term minister and one-term Calcutta mayor…. A founder member who left the party for the Congress in 2004 but returned in 2009 to become one of Didi’s most trusted generals. She is banking not only on his political stature but also on the work he has done as a key minister in her cabinet for eight years now,” said a Trinamul leader from Saltora.

One of Mukherjee’s cabinet colleagues outlined his importance as a minister to Mamata and the party.

“For much of the hegemony we have been able to establish in rural Bengal, the credit must go to Subratada. As the public health engineering as well as panchayat and rural development minister, he worked tirelessly to give people access to better water and roads in some of the remotest parts of the state. Water, for instance, is an important issue in Bankura,” he said.

“As the panchayat and rural development minister, he was pivotal in the implementation of all government schemes and programmes at the grassroots…. Without a man like him handling these initiatives, it would have been difficult for the party to establish such a hegemony in the rural electorate,” he added.

Bankura votes today