Trinamool ahead in Hooghly's ground zero

SINGUR: The abandoned Tata Nano factory still dominates the physical landscape of Singur. It also invariably slips into conversations on the elections in the Singur constituency, which will be held on April 30 along with 17 other seats in the Hooghly district. This is not surprising given that the protests over the Singur factory was one of the critical elements of the Trinamool Congress (TMC) wave that swept the Left Front out of power in 2011.Indeed, in her speech in Apurbapur in the constituency on April 23, chief minister Mamata Banerjee had referred to Singur as the “mother base“ of her politics.
Opinion, however, is firmly divided in Singur on the Nano factory . Villages like Beraberi in the constituency are Trinamool bastions. Basudeb Ghosh of Beraberi is among those who cannot think beyond Mamata. He runs a sweet shop in the village and with his three brothers owned 12 bighas in the factory site.Along with many of his neighbours, who also share the same surname, Basudeb was among the `unwilling' landowners who refused compensation. Though the Nano site is under litigation and there is no immediate prospect of getting their land back, Ghosh and others like him are diehard Trinamool supporters.Part of the reason is that he and an estimated 3,500 `unwilling' families have been getting a dole of Rs 2,000 and 16 kg of rice every month ever since Mamata came to power.
The picture, however, is different among those who accepted compensation. One of those is Udayan Das, a doctor running a nursing home in Singur town and son of a former CPM MLA, who believes that landowners as well as sharecroppers were adequately compensated by the Left Front government. He also thinks that the CPM candidate, Rabin Deb, will defeat the incumbent Trinamool MLA, Rabindranath Bhattacharya, who is referred to as mastermoshai even by his rivals.
According to Das' calculation, there are only 30,00035,000 votes in the Singur industrial area of the 2 lakh plus votes in the entire constituency. But a sampling of opinion seems to suggest that Bhattacharya, who first won here during the height of Left rule in 2001, is still considerably popular.
For the rest of Hooghly, which is a mix of rural constituencies like Goghat to suburban ones like Serampore dotted with ailing factories, it looks like Trinamool might do reasonably well. In the 2011Assembly elections, Trinamool had won 16 of the 18 seats in Hooghly and in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, of the 18 assembly segments the Trinamool again led in 16 segments. It was only in Champdani and Serampore that the Left-Congress combine led in 2014. In fact, in Champdani the ruling party placed third in the 2014 elections and faces a tough contest this time. TMC's Muzaffar Khan is pitted against Congress veteran Abdul Mannan in Champdani, and even the ruling party workers admit that Mannan has the upper hand.
Phul Mohammed, one of several hundred workers at North Brook Jute Mill who are without jobs, voices similar feelings. The crucial element in constituencies like Champdani is where those who backed the BJP, buoyed by a Modi wave, in 2014 choose to cast their vote.
Political observers suggest that despite a united opposition TMC might still end up winning 14 of the 18 seats in Hooghly .
(The author is with the National University of Singapore) (With inputs from Falguni Banerjee)