West Bengal's Left Front hands Bhangar to ISF

The Left Front in West Bengal has decided not to field candidates in Bhangar constituency in favour of Abbas Siddique's new political outfit — the Indian Secular Front (ISF).

Kolkata: Last Sunday on the occasion of International Mother Language Day, Abbas Siddique expressed his desire to field candidates from Bhangar. He claimed this at a public rally in Bhojerhat. His claim prompted the Left Front leadership to discuss the matter. After a lot of discussions, CPI(M) agreed to withdraw its stake from Bhangar constituency in favour of the Indian Secular Front (ISF), the new political outfit floated by Siddique.

The Left and Congress Party are in talks with the Indian Secular Front

The Left Front is determined to come into a seat-sharing agreement with ISF. Left Front leadership feel that ISF can perform exceedingly well in the Bangar constituency, where the majority of voters are from the minority community. Although Congress, which is having an alliance with the Left Front this time, is divided over having ISF in the alliance, the Left Front leadership is going soft over ISF by accepting the demands for different constituencies.

"We have shown enough flexibility. Now Congress will be responsible if the alliance talks fail," a senior Left Front leader said. The Left Front has already agreed to withdraw its claim on three constituencies namely Jamuria, Bhangar and Nandigram.

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Sources said that probably Abbas Siddique's brother Nousad Siddique will contest from Bhangar. The sitting MLA from Bhangar is Trinamool Congress's Abdur Rezzak Mollah, who was the land and land reforms minister in the earlier Left Front government.

On Wednesday, the Left Front appealed to Abbas Siddique to field candidates from the Nandigram assembly constituency in the forthcoming West Bengal assembly election. While Left Front is already having an alliance with Congress for the forthcoming state assembly polls, Congress has some reservations about having a seat-sharing agreement with Siddique's party, the Indian Secular Front (ISF).

With this development, Nandigram has again come into the limelight. West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee has already announced that she herself might contest for Trinamool Congress from Nandigram in the forthcoming polls. Suvendu Adhikary, on his part, has challenged that the chief minister will be defeated in Nandigram by at least 50,000 votes. Now, with the Left Front's offer to ISF the situation becomes even more interesting.

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Barring the first four years after Independence, Left Front was in control of the Nandigram Constituency for a long time, with the winning candidates being from CPI. The majority of voters in Nandigram come from minority communities. Left Front leadership feel that if ISF fields candidates from Nandigram the contest would be interesting since Siddique has sufficient influence on the Mosques and Mazars there. Precisely keeping that in mind Left Front has given this offer to Siddique.

CPI won from this constituency nine consecutive times in the past, while CPI(M) emerged as the victor just once. Since 2009, the Trinamool Congress took total control over Nandigram.

Political analysts also feel that the minority vote factor has played an important role in this decision of the Left Front. Even Siddique himself has given a subtle hint of fielding candidates in Nandigram.

Read: Left asks Abbas Siddique to field candidate from Nandigram