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Come Wednesday, and all eyes would be on Kolkata and the contiguous districts of North and South 24 Paraganas that will be covered in the third round of polling.
With 74 seats up for grabs, the results in these could well decide the fate of political parties.
Barring Kolkata, the North and the South 24 Paraganas have been traditional Left strongholds. In 2006 the Left bagged 20 seats while the Trinamool and its ally SUCI won six in South 24 Paraganas. After delimitation the district has 31 seats. For the North 24 Paraganas the Left accounted for 25 seats while the Trinamool got five. Post-delimitation the number of seats has been raised to 33. In Kolkata, a traditional Congress-Trinamool stronghold, the Left got 10 while the Trinamool and Congress secured 13 seats. After delimitation, Kolkata has 11 constituencies.
Arrogance and Left-builder nexus seem to have shaped the voters' mind more in these districts than anywhere else in the State. "The first thing a new settler encounters is the local club dominated by the cadres. You are forced to purchase building material from them at higher prices," complains Bignesh Chatterjee of Khardah, from where Finance Minister Asim Dasgupta is fighting his toughest battle against FICCI secretary general and Trinamool candidate Amit Mitra.
The Left's conduct apart, closed industries — including the jute factories — and massive unemployment poor health, infrastructure and education figure highly as election issues.
North 24 Paraganas alone account for more than 2.5 lakh official unemployed. The Opposition has capitalised on the 145 odd closed units along Titagarh, Barrackpore and Kachrapara zone.
The Health and education sectors have been the most criticised areas. About 30 per cent of the rural households and slums in Kolkata are hit by malnutrition. Though 74 per cent of the people get healthcare from the hospital about two-third of them have to come to Kolkata for better treatment often on account of shortage of facilities like bed and surgery. Then there are rampant complaints of fleecing by the medical staff. Even Health Minister SK Mishra went on record saying a group of medical staff including doctors were holding the people at ransom.
While the region including Kolkata has a combined strength of more than 9,000 schools including primary secondary and higher secondary ones but the standard of faculty particularly in English continues to be poor. The Opposition has alleged that the Government decision in the 1980s to remove English as a subject till Standard V is the main reason why the State ended up with poor quality teachers. English has been reintroduced from Standard I now.
General issues apart, the fate of the parties would depend upon three factors: The performance of the rebel candidates; the way Muslims vote, and the scheduled cast voters' preference.
Rebels queer the pitch in at least four places including Kolkata Port where sitting Congress MLA RP Ram is contesting as an Independent against the official Trinamool nominee Bobby Hakim, Metiabruz where again rebel Congress MLA Fazle Haque is in the fray. Similarly at Shyampur in North Kolkata another Congress rebel is fighting and from Bijpur in North 24 a Trinamool leader Mrinal Roy is contesting.
The Muslim factor has also been bothering the Left no end. A traditional vote bank the community left Marxists following Sachhar Committee report that depicted the Muslim plight in Bengal. However the Left leadership feel securing 10 per cent jobs for the Muslims might just have started pulling things back towards their side. Muslims account for about 20 per cent of Kolkata's vote bank. In the two 24 Paraganas they account for more than 37 per cent of population.
The community is not happy with the politicians as "they only treat us as vote banks." Aminul Haq, a maulana from Basirhat, said, "We have only been used and no development has come our way. The Left has done some good work but only recently when they suffered a jolt in 2009. This time we have left it upon the voters to decide and the maulavis would not interfere with things."
The Muslims are caught in a bind. While the Left has given them job reservation the Trinamool has offered an increase in pay packets for the Maulanas and madarsa teachers.
The Matuas, who are scheduled caste refugees from East Bengal, have always backed the Left. But the community which has its own religious order — that believes in Vedic worship — with Baro Ma at its helm looks divided. While a portion of the group is backing the Left a majority of them are in the Trinamool side. Baro Ma's son MK Thakur himself is a Trinamool candidate. In North 24 Paraganas alone the Matuas account for more than 12.5 lakh voters. In South 24 Paraganas there are about 2 lakh Matuas.
In fact it is the Matua and Muslim vote that did the Left in, in the 2009 general elections when the Marxists failed to win even a single seat out of 11 they contested from the two 24 Paraganas and Kolkata.
With 74 seats up for grabs, the results in these could well decide the fate of political parties.
Barring Kolkata, the North and the South 24 Paraganas have been traditional Left strongholds. In 2006 the Left bagged 20 seats while the Trinamool and its ally SUCI won six in South 24 Paraganas. After delimitation the district has 31 seats. For the North 24 Paraganas the Left accounted for 25 seats while the Trinamool got five. Post-delimitation the number of seats has been raised to 33. In Kolkata, a traditional Congress-Trinamool stronghold, the Left got 10 while the Trinamool and Congress secured 13 seats. After delimitation, Kolkata has 11 constituencies.
Arrogance and Left-builder nexus seem to have shaped the voters' mind more in these districts than anywhere else in the State. "The first thing a new settler encounters is the local club dominated by the cadres. You are forced to purchase building material from them at higher prices," complains Bignesh Chatterjee of Khardah, from where Finance Minister Asim Dasgupta is fighting his toughest battle against FICCI secretary general and Trinamool candidate Amit Mitra.
The Left's conduct apart, closed industries — including the jute factories — and massive unemployment poor health, infrastructure and education figure highly as election issues.
North 24 Paraganas alone account for more than 2.5 lakh official unemployed. The Opposition has capitalised on the 145 odd closed units along Titagarh, Barrackpore and Kachrapara zone.
The Health and education sectors have been the most criticised areas. About 30 per cent of the rural households and slums in Kolkata are hit by malnutrition. Though 74 per cent of the people get healthcare from the hospital about two-third of them have to come to Kolkata for better treatment often on account of shortage of facilities like bed and surgery. Then there are rampant complaints of fleecing by the medical staff. Even Health Minister SK Mishra went on record saying a group of medical staff including doctors were holding the people at ransom.
While the region including Kolkata has a combined strength of more than 9,000 schools including primary secondary and higher secondary ones but the standard of faculty particularly in English continues to be poor. The Opposition has alleged that the Government decision in the 1980s to remove English as a subject till Standard V is the main reason why the State ended up with poor quality teachers. English has been reintroduced from Standard I now.
General issues apart, the fate of the parties would depend upon three factors: The performance of the rebel candidates; the way Muslims vote, and the scheduled cast voters' preference.
Rebels queer the pitch in at least four places including Kolkata Port where sitting Congress MLA RP Ram is contesting as an Independent against the official Trinamool nominee Bobby Hakim, Metiabruz where again rebel Congress MLA Fazle Haque is in the fray. Similarly at Shyampur in North Kolkata another Congress rebel is fighting and from Bijpur in North 24 a Trinamool leader Mrinal Roy is contesting.
The Muslim factor has also been bothering the Left no end. A traditional vote bank the community left Marxists following Sachhar Committee report that depicted the Muslim plight in Bengal. However the Left leadership feel securing 10 per cent jobs for the Muslims might just have started pulling things back towards their side. Muslims account for about 20 per cent of Kolkata's vote bank. In the two 24 Paraganas they account for more than 37 per cent of population.
The community is not happy with the politicians as "they only treat us as vote banks." Aminul Haq, a maulana from Basirhat, said, "We have only been used and no development has come our way. The Left has done some good work but only recently when they suffered a jolt in 2009. This time we have left it upon the voters to decide and the maulavis would not interfere with things."
The Muslims are caught in a bind. While the Left has given them job reservation the Trinamool has offered an increase in pay packets for the Maulanas and madarsa teachers.
The Matuas, who are scheduled caste refugees from East Bengal, have always backed the Left. But the community which has its own religious order — that believes in Vedic worship — with Baro Ma at its helm looks divided. While a portion of the group is backing the Left a majority of them are in the Trinamool side. Baro Ma's son MK Thakur himself is a Trinamool candidate. In North 24 Paraganas alone the Matuas account for more than 12.5 lakh voters. In South 24 Paraganas there are about 2 lakh Matuas.
In fact it is the Matua and Muslim vote that did the Left in, in the 2009 general elections when the Marxists failed to win even a single seat out of 11 they contested from the two 24 Paraganas and Kolkata.
