Ajoy K Das

Kolkata: The political fallout of Nandigram is widening within the ruling Left Front in West Bengal.

The minor allies in the CPI(M)-led coalition have started thinking about their future in continuing in the front.

Ever since the start of land acquisition for chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya’s industrialisation programme, a ginger group of the RSP, the Forward Bloc and the CPI, known as a ‘mini-front’, had emerged to question land acquisition and its impact on political support in rural West Bengal. But until now these voices of opposition within the Left Front had been muted or stifled by CPI(M) predominance.

But the persistent steamrolling of dissension, and particularly the Nandigram violence, has now prompted the other Left Front constituents to wonder if they should risk their political space by sharing it with the CPI(M).

In their reckoning, CPI(M)-dictated government policies are alienating voters in the state.

The RSP was the first to do a rethink — in the wake of Nandigram, the deployment of central security forces, more land acquisition for industries

It claims most of these issues have not been discussed within the Left Front nor has the government taken non-CPI(M) ministers into confidence. The party's state committee at its recent meeting concluded that any decision on staying in the ruling coalition should not be imposed from the top.

RSP state secretary Debabrata Bandopadhyay said that in 30 years of Left Front rule there had been numerous differences within but all these used to be solved through a "gentlemen's agreement". But over the last two years, the CPI(M)'s 'dadagiri' had created a serious breach of trust among the partners.

According to the RSP state committee, be it on Nandigram, land mapping, Singur, the food riots or Rizwanur's death, the state government's actions violated political discussions within the Left Front. Under the circumstances continuing in the coalition just to be in government was no longer politically feasible, the party concluded.

The RSP has directed its local, zonal and district committees to hold conferences immediately on whether the party should continue in the coalition. The party is also in talks with other allies such as the Forward Bloc and the CPI and they too are expected to take stock of the future of the Left Front. The CPI(M) has brute majority of 176 seats in the state assembly of 294; its allies have just 58 seats.

But if the allies' threats eventually turn into a reality, it could lead to a realignment in Bengal politics. Even a marginal change in the Left Front's vote share of 51% could yield very different electoral results in the future. The Left Front's uninterrupted 30 years in power is largely because of the consolidation of the Left vote and the splintering of the opposition.

Source : DNA