Days before the by-elections in three Assembly seats in West Bengal, the house of a BJP MP was attacked on Wednesday morning.
Crude bombs were hurled at Barrackpore MP Arjun Singh's house at Bhatpara in North 24 Parganas district. Singh, however, was in Delhi when the attack took place.
Singh's son Pawan is a BJP MLA from Bhatpara.
BJP sources had said Singh would be the poll observer of the BJP in Bhawanipur Assembly seat where Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee will be fighting her do-or-die battle.
Even if the ruling Trinamool Congress has an absolute majority in the West Bengal Assembly, Banerjee would have to win the by-election to retain the chief minister’s chair. Today, she held a party workers’ meet at Bhawanipur and would file her nomination on September 10.
Amid rising number of COVID-19 cases, the Election Commission has banned public rallies and door-to-door campaigns. That may, perhaps, lower the tempo of the politics but would in no way reduce the tension as the attack on Singh's house suggests. Political observers believe that violence might replace the high decibel political campaign in Bhawanipur, a prominent South Kolkata hub.
The Congress has decided not to contest the Bhawanipur seat. The party, however, has not made it clear whether it would campaign for its alliance partner, the CPI(M), which has already declared its candidate. The Congress's decision would determine whether it will get support of the Left in two other seats in Murshidabad district. In order to make the alliance stand on the ground, the Congress would soon have to decide on its political stand.
The BJP, on the other hand, is meeting today to fix its candidates in three seats. In Bhawanipur many names are being discussed. Anirban Ganguly, director of Syama Prasad Mukherjee Research Foundation, Sajal Ghosh, a former Congress leader, and Biswajit Sarkar, brother of slain BJP youth leader in Kolkata, whose murder in Maniktala on May 2 has been mentioned as horrific by the court, are a few of them.
BJP’s Bengal chief Dilip Ghosh said that the state unit's recommendations had been sent to the central leadership. Suvendu Adhikari, leader of the opposition in West Bengal Assembly, is meeting Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Wednesday. Sources said among many things, Adhikari would discuss the candidature for Bhawanipur seat as well. BJP leadership would also hold a meeting with Arjun Singh about the future strategy.
