While top leaders of political parties typically don’t campaign for municipal elections and leave this to the local leadership, the municipal polls in West Bengal are different. The civic body polls in West Bengal, in more than 80 municipalities, are going to take place barely a year before the crucial assembly elections.
After the party’s debacle in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections, the CPI (M) leadership is convinced the polls will be an important signal as to which way the voter is moving. So, top politburo members like Sitaram Yechury and Brinda Karat along with other senior leaders of the state party will be campaigning aggressively for the municipal elections. Karat and Yechury have another reason to sweat out in Bengal — both are members of the Rajya Sabha through West Bengal and need to renew their membership from the statein 2011.