Kolkata, Nov 03 (UNI) A three-cornered battle is on the cards in all the three Assembly seats of Kharagpur, Karimpur and Kaliaganj for November 25 by-election in Bengal.
The BJP on Saturday announced the names of candidates – Premchand Jha from Kharagpur, Jaiprakash Mazumder from Karimpur and Kamal Chandra Sirkar from Kaliaganj Assembly constituencies. The Congress-Left Front combine and the Trinamool Congress have also announced their candidates.
The Trinamool Congress announced that Pradip Sarkar, chairman of Kharagpur Municipality, will contest from Kharagpur, while Bimalendu Singh Roy and Tapan Deb Singh will contest from Karimpur and Kaliaganj Assembly constituencies respectively.
In the electoral understanding, the Left Front (LF) has kept two seats for the Congress to contest instead of fielding their candidates. The LF will be contesting from Karimpur and has left the Kharagpur and Kaliaganj for the Congress candidates. Golam Rabbi is the Left candidate in Karimpur in Nadia district. Left Front leader Biman Basu said his party will support the Congress candidates in Kharagpur and Kaliaganj. He also said the Left Front-Congress alliance will unite all the voters against Trinamool Congress and BJP in the state.
West Bengal Congress president Somendra Nath Mitra had said they had a meeting with party president Sonia Gandhi in New Delhi and have got green signal for the seat adjustment with the Left. ” We felt that this seat adjustment is necessary to stop the ruling TMC and BJP from making further headway. It has been decided that the Congress would contest Kaliaganj seat in North Dinajpur district and Kharagpur in West Midnapore district. ” The Congress fielded Ms Dhitasree Roy from Kaliagunj and Chittaranjan Mondal from Kharagpur Assembly seats.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP increased its presence in the state considerably and came up as the main Opposition, much ahead of the Left parties and Congress. According to the results of last Lok Sabha elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had a lead in Kharagpur and Kaliaganj while Trinamool was ahead in Karimpur.
The by-poll to Kaliaganj seat was necessitated following the death of sitting Congress MLA Parmathanath Roy, while Kharagpur Sadar seat fell vacant after BJP’s Dilip Ghosh was elected from Medinipur Lok Sabha constituency. Karimpur Assembly constituency also fell vacant after TMC’s Mahua Moitra romped home from the Krishnnanagar Lok Sabha seat.
A fierce contest is in all likelihood as the ruling Trinamool will spare no pains to make up for the lost ground in the recently concluded Lok Sabha election, while the saffron brigade will also go all out to further tighten its noose as it jacked up its Lok Sabha tally from mere two to 18 in Bengal.
For the Congress, it’s a struggle for existence as it somehow managed two LS seats from the state, while the LF had to lick dust with its vote share plummeting drastically. The dismal show compelled the Congress and the LF to go for an electoral tie-up in the by-poll to put up a semblance of respectability.
