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STATES: ASSEMBLY ELECTIONS
2001
Age No Bar
| PARTY TALK |
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"Thanks to
Mahanta, the Biharisation of Assam has now begun."
Sumanta Chaliha
Breakaway ASOM-BJP leader on the use of money power
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| Gowri (centre) has her
ear to the ground |
Thiruvananthapuram: Eighty-two is not
the right age for one to be going around settling old scores, but Kalathilparambil
Raman Gowri will beg to disagree. The legendary communist revolutionary,
who had authored Kerala's land reforms way back in 1957 as the minister
of revenue in the first E.M.S. Namboodiripad government, is contesting
for the state Assembly for the 12th straight time from her native Aroor
in Alappuzha. She won 10 times. The constituents of coastal Aroor did
not let down their favourite kunjamma even after her policies underwent
a sea change in 1994. That was the year she was expelled from the CPI(M)
and formed the Janadhipathya Samrakshana Samiti (JSS) which became part
of the Congress-led United Democratic Front. Two years later, in the 1996
assembly elections, Gowri won by a record margin against the CPI(M) nominee.
She is confident this time too. "I had forsaken everything including
my husband and family for that party. I have a lot of scores to settle
with it," she says. When the Communist Party of India split after
the war with China, Gowri chose to ally with the CPI(M) while her husband-and
state cabinet colleague T.V. Thomas-stayed with the mother party. Her
party leaders even ordered her not to stay in the same house as her husband.
At the end of it all, she found herself tossed out of the party. She surely
has reasons to feel combative.
His Father's Son
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| Mukherjee slugs it |
Kolkata: What's a young Doon School-Presidency
College-Cambridge University alumnus doing in the backwaters of Krishnanagar
in West Bengal? Soumendranath Mukherjee, son of BJP MP Satyabrata Mukherjee,
is contesting on the party ticket from Nakashipura which falls under his
father's parliamentary constituency. The 40-year-old barrister-Sluggo
to friends-may seem like a misfit here, but he is not. Friends who gave
him his nickname after his sluggish ways may not recognise him now. Campaigning
well past midnight every day, Sluggo is a man on the move. His mother
Urmibala (who is contesting from neighbouring Kaliganj) says Sluggo is
more clued in than most. "He monitored his father's campaigns in
the past," she says. The family initially wasn't keen on anyone joining
politics, but after the father won, the people wanted the son to follow
in his footsteps.
Jumbo Task
 Guwahati:
The chief election officer of Kamrup district in Assam, D.N. Saikia, has
an elephantine task on hand, perhaps the most daunting faced by election
officers anywhere in the country. To carry his election officials and
vote boxes back and forth from the polling booths, Saikia-who is also
the district magistrate-has had to organise 98 buses, 298 mini-buses,
39 light vehicles, 15 motorised boats, 12 country boats, 52 bullock carts
and 94 porters. That's not all. To access remote areas, Saikia has had
to requisition the services of five horses and eight elephants.
POLLSPEAK: BUDDHADEV BHATTACHARYA,
West Bengal CM
 Q.
How confident are you of winning the elections?
A.
I am absolutely optimistic. There is no uncertainty at all. There is no
alternative to the Left Front. At least not as yet.
Q. The opposition parties charge you with
non-performance.
A. This charge will fall on deaf ears because the people know we have
performed. A section of the urban poor may still vote against us but we
have been able to convince another section to vote for us.
Q. The Left Front's strength fell from 245
to 203 between 1991 and 1996. Will it fall further?
A.
Politics is not arithmetic. You can't plot the future graph of politics
from past figures.
Q. The CPI(M) hasn't tasted defeat since
1972. How do you manage to sense public opinion?
A. We
have gained in experience. When we came to power in 1972, the CPI(M) had
only 38,000 party members. Now there are more than two lakh.
Q. Throughout the campaign you never mentioned
Mamata Banerjee by name even once. What is your personal assessment of
her?
A.
I think she is devoid of ideology. Though she comes from the Congress
flock she does not have the Congress orientation. At the same time, she
is not honest to the BJP also.
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