Missed opportunity

Trinamool Congress (TMC) Member of Parliament Abhishek Banerjee took much flak from political commentators when his followers assaulted a young man who slapped him at a public rally in West Bengal's East Midnapore district. Banerjee's failure to stop his supporters from beating up his assaulter has not gone unnoticed by his political rivals in Kolkata. At a gathering last week, a member of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) - that ruled the state for 34 years before the Mamata Banerjee-led TMC came to power - drew parallels with Aam Aadmi Party leader Arvind Kejriwal, who had similarly been slapped by autorickshaw driver Lali in Delhi last year. He pointed out that Banerjee lost out on an opportunity to reap political dividends, as did Kejriwal, who went on to visit the autorickshaw driver at his modest home, with camera-clicking media in tow, a day before Delhi went to the Lok Sabha polls on April 10.