With a violent sun beating down at 41 degrees, it is not easy to conduct roadshows and it is perhaps equally tiresome to watch with patience a lengthy procession go by kicking up a literal dust storm. But both things are happening in BJP’s Hooghly lok Sabha candidate Chandan Mitra’s roadshows.
“Aha re ei gorome ki koshto balun dekhi! Bhadrolok ke kibhabe ghorache! O baba haat nartey hobey na omni vote debo! (look at the pain he is taking in this heat! look how this gentleman is taken around in this open truck! You need not worry, I will definitely vote for you!),” swears an 80-plus Bibharani Manna, her motherly affection oozing out, at Khanyan More from where Mitra’s roadshow took off well past nine.
That the BJP is fast coming from behind to steal the roadshows, nay the shows, is proved by Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s additional concentration on the constituencies she feels threatened by the lotus in Bengal. Hooghly clearly seems to be one of them.Banerjee has been literally following up with a meeting after the BJP conducts one successfully at a given place. As senior leader lK Advani’s election meeting at Bhadreshwar had evoked a huge response, the Chief Minister responded with her own meeting a couple of days later, said a local journalist.
Wary of Sunday’s election meeting at Serampore by BJP prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, the Trinamool Congress chief has once again made adjustments in her rally schedules. She would also hold a meeting at Serampore after Modi is done.The Gujarat Chief Minister would hold a rally on Sunday evening in support of party candidates Bappi lahiri and Chandan Mitra.Mitra said, “Irrespective of claims made by different political parties, it is for all to see that there is no trace of Congress or for that matter the left Front, which has fled the battleground and now the real contest is between the TMC and the BJP.”
On whether he is sure to win, he said the kind of overwhelming response he has been witnessing lotus is sure to bloom in Hooghly currently held by Trinamool. The overwhelming response seems to have overwhelmed the BJP candidate so much that at times it becomes difficult for him to keep away the admirers from literally mobbing him.Dipankar, Khanyan block in-charge of the party said, “We have picked up immensely and have come in a position from where we will be able to even beat the Trinamool.”
The unadulterated adoration for the lotus reached a high with local women performing the aarti of Mitra showering flowers, blowing conch-shells and saying prayers just as they do to their sons going to face interview boards.The heat is so oppressing that the onlookers are frantically looking for banyan shades. “Much the way India is trying to find out under Modiji,” said an unknown partyman donning a Modi mask. “Three people have died of heat stroke in past two days but nothing will scare us,” he insisted before hopping on to the mini truck shouting “tiris tarik aasche din padma pooley vote din (vote for lotus).”
Even as the long convoy rolls on from one village to the other, people throng the roads many often running dangerous close to the running vehicles to get a leaflet. “Bhoy nai aamra aachi (no worries we are with you),” yells a voter near Khanyan Railway Station.On the issue that Mitra is mainly harping on this time round, the noted journalist-cum-Rajya Sabha member said, “Hooghly has a rich heritage. But the area is industrially backward, thanks to the faulty policies of the left Front and the TMC.” He promises to bring industry and create jobs for thousands of the educated youth here who have to go to other States in search of employment.
On the Saradha and teachers appointment scams Mitra said, “Though the lok Sabha elections mainly relate to the central issues, indeed these scams have become an important factor in these elections.”