Big win for Mamata Banerjee in Bhabanipur by-poll, retains Bengal CM post

Romps home by a margin of 58,832 votes over BJP's Priyanka Tibrewal

West Bengal Chief Minister, Mamata Banerjee, has won the prestige battle at Bhabanipur beating her previous record.

Banerjee won the high stakes by-poll, allowing her to continue in office, by a margin of more than 58,000 votes. “We have won Bhabanipur by a margin of 58,835 votes registered victory in every ward of the constituency,” said Banerjee after the poll result was announced Sunday afternoon.

“Around 46 per cent of the people in the constituency are non-Bengalis and they have all voted for me,” she added.

Her nearest rival, Priyanka Tibrewal, from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), got 26,428 votes while Shrijeeb Biswas from the Communist Party of India (Marxist) managed to get just 4,226 votes.

Tibrewal tweeted: I am overwhelmed by the affection of people and commitment of my party leadership and workers who put in many times more effort than myself. I express my deep sense of gratitude… I rededicate with greater vigour to be in service of people.

In the recently concluded Assembly elections in West Bengal, Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay from the Trinamool Congress had won from Bhabanipur by 28,719 votes.

Chattopadhyay resigned from his seat to make way for Banerjee, who lost narrowly from Nandigram, even as she led the party to a landslide victory in West Bengal. To remain Chief Minister, she had to be elected within six months.

The results, however, show that Banerjee not only ensured her stay in office, but managed to beat her own margin of 54,213 votes in the by-poll of 2011 – a historic year that brought the curtains down on a 34-year Left rule in the state. In 2016, she had won by a margin of 25,301 votes.  

In the assembly polls — Samserganj and Jangipur — the Trinamool Congress won by 26,379 votes and 92,480 votes, resepectively. In 2016, it had won Samserganj by a margin of 1780 votes and Jangipur by 20,633 votes.  

However, all eyes were on the high-profile Bhabanipur constituency even though Banerjee’s win was almost certain. A cosmopolitan constituency with Marwaris, Gujaratis, Punjabis and other non-Bengalis accounting for more than 40 per cent, it had given the BJP a slender lead of 185 votes in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP was trailing by 2,868 votes and could take a lead in Banerjee’s own ward by 476 votes.

However, political analyst Sabyasachi Basu Ray Chaudhury, pointed out that it was a convincing victory for Banerjee in the by-poll as even the non-Bengali population wards of 70 and 77 voted in her favour.

Though just a by-poll, the Trinamool is looking to strengthen the party’s fight for the general elections of 2024 with this win. Ahead of the by-poll, Banerjee had told party workers that it was the next step for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

On Sunday, Firhad Hakim, one of the cabinet ministers in charge of the campaign in Bhabanipur, tweeted, people of Bhabanipur have chosen the leader of this nation, come 2024!

After the thumping victory in the Assembly elections with 213 seats in the 294-West Bengal assembly, the Trinamool Congress had made it clear that it would reach out to other states.

Since then, it has made strides in Tripura and recently welcomed former Goa chief minister and veteran Congress leader, Luizinho Faleiro, into its fold. The party is said to have set eyes on Meghalaya, too.