West Bengal: BJP’s face of Sandeshkhali fight loses by 3.3 lakh+ votes

KOLKATA: Basirhat Lok Sabha constituency, which includes Sandeshkhali, handed over a decisive mandate to TMC with its candidate Haji Nurul Islam trouncing BJP’s Rekha Patra by a margin of over 3.3 lakh votes. Trinamool not only retained Basirhat but maintained its lead in Sandeshkhali assembly segment, which is a part of the Lok Sabha constituency. All trouble spots in Sandeshkhali also voted in Trinamool’s favour.
The restive belt has been on the boil since Jan 5 when an ED team came under mob attack near the premises of suspended TMC strongman Sheikh Shahjahan.ED officials had gone to Sarberia in Sandeshkhali to raid premises of Shahjahan, an accused in the ration scam.
BJP had whipped up a political storm over the alleged atrocities on women and land grabbing by local Trinamool functionaties. The party fielded greenhorn Patra, an alleged victim of atrocities, against Islam, an MLA and former MP. Even PM Narendra Modi promoted Patra as “shakti swaroopa” (embodiment of Shakti).
A series of accusation followed with a section of women alleging sexual abuse and land grabbing by Shahjahan and his men. While their agitation led to arrest of Shahjahan, Uttam Sardar and Shibu Hazra, it took a political turn with TMC accusing BJP of engineering the agitation. They countered the claim with sting videos which claimed that it was a ‘false’ campaign prompted by BJP.
Reacting to TMC win, Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee said: “People of Sandeshkhali have responded to this vicious campaign by voting for us where we led not only in the Sandeshkhali assembly segment but in the booths in localities where people protested. I salute people of Sandeshkhali.”
“This is a victory for the people who have been with us all along. People in their verdict have shown that the Sandeshkhali campaign was baseless,” said Haji Nurul Islam.
Patra, on the other hand, claimed: “Voting was rigged in at least 500 booths by TMC.”
Around 54% of the 18,04,261 voters in Basirhat belong to the minority community. In 2019, TMC won the seat by 3,50,369 votes.