What top Congress leaders couldn’t achieve in four days of hectic consultations, party president Sonia Gandhi did in just an hour—sealing the seat-deal with Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress. On Monday, after a closed-doors meeting first with her political secretary Ahmed Patel and then Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Gandhi closed the deal overlooking the demands of the state unit of the Congress.
Top party sources suggest, the dismal performance of the Congress in the last year’s civic elections in West Bengal and the withdrawal of the support of the Left parties three years ago were two of the key factors that led Gandhi to opt for a tie up with Banerjee even at the cost of getting a humble share of seats.
Gandhi has been told that the party can mop up around 40 seats with Trinamool support. It currently has 17 MLAs in the assembly.
The assessment of the top Congress leadership was that it had “experimented” by going alone in the civic polls last year. It boomeranged as the Congress went down to just ten seats in Kolkata Corporation and it managed to win only 11 municipalities. She was also reminded that most of the state leaders who are pitching for an “honourable” alliance now, had voiced the same demand at that time as well but had failed to deliver.
Top leader also told Gandhi that there is a wave in favour of Banerjee and “people of Bengal want the Left to go”. “If the Congress fails to address this sentiment in a positive way, we might face a severe electoral backlash,” said a top leader who was consulted by Gandhi before taking the decision.
Her party managers also informed Gandhi that they had tried to get three additional seats and exchange another four seats. But Banerjee, on a power-spree in the state, refused to give in and agreed to just one additional seat and another one exchanged.
The High Command also assessed that if there is a split, the Left Front will get “political space”. This was unacceptable as the question is what would the Congress get from the Left in return? “If they had been our supporters in the Centre, the situation could have been different. But they supported the UPA for four years that too, creating constant hurdles in governance,” said a top Congress source.
The party is not paying much importance to the large number of disgruntled state Congress leaders. “It is quite natural that those who have not got tickets will be unhappy. But it is not necessary to accommodate everyone,” said a top leader.
