The winter session of the Parliament was always going to be explosive, thanks to the Lok Pal Bill that was on the agenda. Yet the first ten days of the session were dominated by hullabaloo surrounding the Prime Minister’s pet policy initiative—foreign direct investment (FDI) in multi-brand retail. The policy move saw the opposition smell blood and in an unprecedented event, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Left stood united, even as the government was pushed against the wall to roll back the policy.
The announcement, ultimately, came far from the corridors of the North Block and 7 Race Course Road. On a Saturday evening, Mamata Banerjee, chief minister of West Bengal and the second largest ally in the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) stood in Writers’ Building in Kolkata and told media persons that she had been assured by Pranab Mukherjee that FDI had been suspended. With the announcement, she walked away with the honours of being responsible for torpedoing the initiative.
This is the new and improved Didi, who rode the wave of poriborton, causing the ouster of the 34 year-old, mighty Left from Bengal. “She has evolved from being a street fighter to being a politician. Look at how she steamrolled discussions to her will in the Teesta water issue. But as far as her administration goes, many questions have still been left unanswered,” said Sabyasachi Basu Ray Chaudhury, political commentator. The questions he refers to include the land policy where she has pledged not to acquire an inch of land in a state where the average size of land holdings is less than a hectare.
Then, when 200 people died in the state due to unnatural circumstances—the AMRI fire and the hooch tragedy—instead of being castigated for the deaths as any other chief minister would most likely have been, Banerjee rose like a phoenix. Indeed, she even got sympathy and praise from the unlikeliest of sources, including her once nemesis Ratan Tata. She was hailed as the heroine who controlled crowds and prevented a stampede at the site of the AMRI fire; she was the empathiser who disbursed ex gratia, without worrying about the state’s debt of Rs 1.92 lakh crore—no matter that part of the blame for the AMRI fire rested with the state fire department as well.
“Why is the managing director still out and the directors, who were not even involved in the day-to-day functioning behind bars for an accident? Why is no one to be blamed when 22 infants die in a state hospital? Where is the shouldering of responsibility?” asked another city-based businessman.
Mamata Banerjee’s pyrrhic victory means West Bengal has already had its date with destiny this year, irrespective of whether she goes down in history as an able administrator, a good politician or the eternal street fighter.
