The Mamata model

The GDP growth indicators are good, the monsoon looks normal and Mamata Banerjee and her Trinamul Congress have emerged victorious in the Kolkata municipal corporation polls. Though the Left is quoting statistics to justify its defeat, their argument has little meaning. This election was not fought on local issues; it was a battle to determine who will rule West Bengal after the next Assembly elections. The Congress, too, received a timely reality check.

Ms Banerjee is a charismatic leader who practises what most leaders preach. She is known to maintain a frugal lifestyle with no special security, no private planes or helicopters, no fancy cars or any form of material excess. More than anything, she has proved that coalition politics is not about making compromises for temporary gains. Look at her resolve and her single-point objective of defeating the Left ever since she was elected to Parliament in 1984.
We celebrate her victory today but the fact is that it has come after a struggle of 25 years, during which many of her associates perished while fighting the Left’s dominance in the state. To sustain and win such a long innings requires more than political skill. During this long span of time Ms Banerjee experienced peaks and valleys on several occasions.
The battle is far from over but I think Ms Banerjee will find the Assembly elections easier to handle, and there is no reason why the alliance with the Congress should fall apart. In all fairness it was important to test the strength of the coalition in the civic body polls. Ms Banerjee will win the Assembly elections by a landslide, and the longer the Left delays the elections, the bigger will be its loss.
I still remember the first time Rajiv Gandhi and I met Ms Banerjee. In 1984, we had more than 10 “difficult seats” to fill in West Bengal and after meeting her for a minute or two Rajiv Gandhi, the then Congress president, asked me to find a “suitable seat” for Ms Banerjee. She had to battle the veteran Somnath Chatterjee, who had never lost an election and was a devastating speaker in the House. Ms Banerjee won, if I remember correctly, by a margin of more than 50,000 votes and, during that election, the Congress won 409 out of the total 542 Lok Sabha seats. But we had a very tough fight in West Bengal where we won only 16 out of 42 seats.
We have serious security issues in West Bengal and Ms Banerjee has given a very balanced view of the situation. As the largest partner of the United Progressive Alliance coalition government, she has an important role to play in the Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs and Cabinet Committee on Security.
The Central Bureau of Investigation is probing the Gyaneshwari Express tragedy and it is good that both the Centre and the state are involved in this decision. While there is no doubt that the media plays an important role as the watchdog of society, information about security issues leaked to the media puts our security forces at risk. One can only request all concerned to use discretion.
Politics never takes a vacation. As the civic polls get over in West Bengal, the battle for Bihar is beginning and the pitch for early elections in Tamil Nadu is rising. The alliance of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and the Congress looks stronger than the All-India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam. But to predict which way the Pattali Makkal Katchi will go, I think, requires the services of an eminent astrologer.
The DMK family wars are far from over but in the presence of chief minister M. Karunanidhi it is unlikely that a full-scale war will break out in the family. The alliance pattern in the family can change, keeping in mind the ground reality in Tamil Nadu. With the 2G spectrum allocation scam, the DMK has a serious issue to handle. Unless Prime Minister Manmohan Singh acts fast, this issue will also dent the Congress’ image. The documents are in the public domain and this is without doubt the “scam of the century”. It may involve many others from the DMK political family apart from communications and information technology minister A. Raja.
The Rajya Sabha elections may well see several “alliances” of a short-term nature but one should not read too much into these situations. In coalition politics there is always “give and take” which swiftly disappears when the event is over and the objective achieved.
In politics, the lesson of the week is for leaders to control their nerves and practice what they preach. The charismatic firebrand from Bengal has shown the way.

WHILE THE death sentences awarded to Afzal Guru and Ajmal Kasab are still to be carried out, three more people have been sentenced to death for the attack on the Akshardham Temple. This is an issue that will continue to fester for a long time.
There are reports indicating that the 2008 Indian embassy bombing in Kabul was planned by the Pakistan Army. The situation in Pakistan continues to be chaotic and, besides daily bomb blasts, there are media stories that the United States is thinking of taking “action” in different forms if the recent bombing effort in Times Square was traced to Pakistan. Whatever be the outcome of that investigation, we see increased terror activity in Jammu and Kashmir. As I repeat every week, security (external and internal) must be our primary responsibility, especially since we face multiple threats from different sources.

Arun Nehru is a former Union Minister