A fistful of hope
If there is a binding narrative to these five assembly election verdicts, it is that they made cold sense — these results were not forced by the brute power of large party machines. In West Bengal, the Trinamool Congress ended the Left’s 34-year-long regime in one heady day. Tamil Nadu overthrew a couple of well-worn, patronising ideas about the electorate — that flamboyant corruption and nepotism of the kind practised by the DMK do not matter to the average voter, so long as they are placated by free consumer durables and housing schemes. Whether or not Jayalalithaa has positioned herself as a genuine alternative to that kind of politics, the magnitude of her victory will be a moderating factor against the kind of unaccountability the DMK cloaked itself in. And Assam resisted the compartmentalising of its vote by political gamers, and returned the Congress, under Tarun Gogoi, back to power, endorsing his moves towards lasting peace in the state.
Apart from Bengal, there was no sense of an ideological face-off — they simply went with the party that would better address the aspirations of a buoyant, hopeful electorate. Even in Bengal, the Left was suckerpunched because it failed to embody that desire for change. Kerala saw a much more narrow fight — the Left can certainly take some comfort in the fact that they came this close to bucking the UDF-LDF see-saw, and that their overall defeat is less of a conclusive writing off by their voters. As for the Congress, which has been deeply invested in all five arenas, these results have been both heartening and cautionary in equal parts — the coalition has been battered in Tamil Nadu and it has swept Bengal, and the party by itself has notched up an impressive victory in Assam. Again, it needs to learn to behave like the centre of a durable coalition — give the Trinamool a reason to stick around for the long haul. Its behaviour with the DMK has shown that a politics of coalition expediency sways nobody.
Historic Friday
Friday, May 13, has entered the annals of history as the day the 34-year-old, uninterrupted, Left Front rule came to an end in West Bengal. Mamata Banerjee has overwhelmingly triumphed; and what she is riding Writers’ Buildings into is not a wave but a tsunami. In a near-reversal of the 2006 verdict that had decimated the standalone Trinamool Congress, the Trinamool and Congress alliance has vanquished the Left, sparing not even the erstwhile regime’s chief minister and his cabinet giants. That is the range and depth of Banerjee’s victory, given her salience as Bengal’s lone anti-Left voice that didn’t fall silent during the Left Front’s brightest days in the sun. She had waited a long time for this moment; her tenacity and patience have finally paid off. Although long predictable, hers was by no means an easy accomplishment.
However, Bengal’s first woman chief minister’s test begins now. From agitationist, Banerjee must move to administrator. For, what lies ahead is an unenviable task. Bengal is near-bankrupt, it needs industry and employment, its education and health sectors need to be salvaged and rebuilt on a war-footing. Yet, nothing will be done in a day; but Banerjee must now put her agenda for governance and recovery on the wall. She must not only talk, but work, and be seen to be doing so. Because, the desperation and discontent behind the hunger for change that has swept her to power demand her to act, from Day 1. From the euphoria of this historic triumph, the new dispensation’s transit to the daily business of governing will be closely watched.
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