Left horror, Part 3 - Panchayat, Lok Sabha and now municipal ; Front 3, Opposition 13 BARUN GHOSH, The Telegraph Calcutta, July 1: Bengal today handed another resounding victory to the Opposition, battering the Left Front in the civic elections and extending the trend of the panchayat and parliamentary polls. The municipal results signal what looks like an irreversible decline ahead of the Assembly polls in the Left’s support in most parts of the state and among a wide cross-section of voters. The Trinamul Congress and the Congress together won 13 of the 16 municipalities this time, unseating the Left in as many as seven boards. The Left won only three municipalities — Malbazar and Gangarampur in north Bengal, and Rajarhat-Gopalpur in south Bengal. Even in the Siliguri Mahakuma Parishad — a three-tier panchayat system — the Congress made its debut by winning three of the seven seats and came close to unseating the Left which has been winning all the slots ever since the council was formed in 1989. In 2004, the Left had won 10 of the 16 municipalities, the Congress four and Trinamul the lone Egra municipality, that too along with the Congress. A notable territorial advance for the Opposition was in the Asansol Municipal Corporation of Burdwan, a red bastion. In the Lok Sabha elections, Burdwan was one of the few districts that held on to the Left. In the Asansol municipal corporation, while Trinamul bagged 18 seats and the Congress 11, the Left got only 20. But in 2004, the Left alone had 39 seats in the 50-member corporation while the Congress had eight and Trinamul three. Taken along with the panchayat and Lok Sabha polls, the trend in the municipal elections would mean a huge surge of support for the Opposition in villages and towns and among both Hindus and Muslims and the middle class and the poor. Reacting to the results, Trinamul Congress chief Mamata Banerjee said: “Now it’s time for the CPM to quit after taking a lesson from another humiliating poll debacle after the Lok Sabha elections.” However, CPM state secretary and Left Front chairperson Biman Bose said the alliance had no plans to advance the Assembly polls, due in 2011. “The civic election outcome mainly reflects the voting trend that emerged during the Lok Sabha elections,” he added. “We don’t think so,” Bose said, responding to the Opposition’s demand to advance the Assembly elections. But transport minister Subhas Chakraborty spoke of a spiralling concern. “The results are very bad for the Left Front and I knew this was going to happen. When the downslide for a party begins, it cannot be stopped overnight. Nothing much has happened between the Lok Sabha elections and the municipal polls that will change the trend for the Left Front overnight.” The Left defeat could have been worse if the Congress and Trinamul had not fought each other in some of the civic bodies. The failure to forge the alliance in one ward cost the Opposition the Malbazar municipality in Jalpaiguri district. In the municipality, while the ruling Left got eight seats, the Opposition bagged seven. “Our combined votes in Ward 8 would have been 478 against the CPM’s 530 if there was an understanding between us. We are just 52 short of what the CPM bagged. I believe that unity among us would have brought us these 52 extra votes,” said Bireswar Sarkar, the Congress district president of Jalpaiguri. The two parties failed to reach an electoral understanding in three other municipalities in north Bengal — Kaliaganj, Islampur and Gangarampur. Although an alliance was worked out for a couple of municipalities in south Bengal districts, unofficial contests did take place between the two. Take the case of the Rajarhat-Gopalpur municipality in North 24-Parganas where the Trinamul nominee and a Congress-backed independent candidate unofficially fought each other to jeopardise the alliance’s poll prospects. “There is no denying that we had failed to reach a complete poll understanding with Trinamul in some south Bengal municipalities where we had worked out an alliance to meet the demands of our local level leaders. But despite all these odds, the people overwhelmingly voted for the Opposition,” said Congress working president Subrata Mukherjee. The Opposition parties not only swept the elections but managed to reduce the number of seats the Left won even in the two municipalities where it retained hold. In Gangarampur, the Left got only 12 seats this time against 15 in 2004. Similarly, in Rajarhat-Gopalpur, the Left tally is 19 against 21 last time. This time, the newly formed Dankuni municipality near Singur in Hooghly went to the Opposition with Trinamul bagging 11 and the Congress 1. In ward 63 of the Calcutta Municipal Corporation, where a by-election was held following the death of Ajit Panja, Trinamul’s Susmita Bhattacharya won by defeating the CPM nominee by 1,300 votes. Cong wins three mahakuma parishad seats... ... but blames break-up of pact for power loss OUR CORRESPONDENT, The Telegraph A Congress victory celebration at Phansidewa on Wednesday. (Kundan Yolmo) Siliguri, July 1: The Congress managed to secure three of the seven berths in the Siliguri Mahakuma Parishad, the first time any party other than the CPM making an entry since the rural body’s inception in 1989. The Congress, however, missed the chance to form the board because of lack of co-ordination with the Trinamul Congress. The CPM has retained control by winning four of the seven SMP seats, much to the relief of the party unit in Darjeeling. For minister Asok Bhattacharya, the SMP fight was an acid test after the CPM’s miserable show in the general elections. The Congress made further inroads into the panchayat samities by bagging Naxalbari and Phansidewa, both CPM bastions since 1989. The SMP came into existence a year after the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill council had been formed, cleaving the district into two administrative zones at the panchayat level. The Left Front, however, retained Matigara and Kharibari. Supporters of the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha and the Akhil Bharatiya Adivasi Vikas Parishad also cut into the Left votes, especially in the tea belt of Naxalbari and Phansidewa. Shankar Malakar, the Darjeeling district Congress president, said: “Winning three seats is definitely a major achievement for us as for the first time, non-CPM representatives will step into the SMP.” “We could have taken control of the board had we won one more seat. The Trinamul leadership will also have to take responsibility as they fielded two candidates, violating the alliance and did not work wholeheartedly for our candidates. None of their candidates could win the elections,” said Malakar. Gautam Deb, the Darjeeling district president of Trinamul, said his party could not strike an absolute alliance in the SMP elections, leading to a close miss. “But I do not want to get into a blame game.” Jyoti Tirkey of the CPM has won with the highest margin of 4,784 votes in Seat 1 of the SMP. Both Trinamul and the Congress had fielded candidates in the seats. The Congress secured 9,101 votes, while the Trinamul got only 975 votes. In the seat, the BJP secured 3,953 votes and an Independent, backed by the Parishad polled 2,433 votes. In Seat 2, CPM’s Bikashkali Biswas won by a margin of 981 votes. The candidates of the BJP and the KPP secured 981 and 1,928 votes respectively. In Seat 3, the Congress candidate, Prerana Singha, has emerged victorious, beating the CPM candidate by 2,010 votes. The CPM retained Seat 4 where Sudhir Burman defeated Trinamul candidate by 1,222 votes. Seat 5 and Seat 6 were won by the Congress with the margins being more than 3,000 votes. The CPM managed to keep the seventh seat, where Pascal Minj, the sahakari sabhadhipati of SMP, won by 1,536 votes. “We were confident of winning at least five seats as the contest was really tough in the SMP seats in Phansidewa and Naxalbari. We ended with four seats as the Congress had tied up with the Morcha and the Parishad,” said Bhattacharya. He added that a decision was yet to be taken on the sabhadhipati. Jalpaiguri results The results of three byelections held in Jalpaiguri district on June 30 were also announced on Wednesday. In two panchayat seats of Churabhandar and Ramsai in Mainaguri block, the RSP and Trinamul emerged as winners. The BJP bagged a seat of the Dhupguri Panchayat Samiti, defeating the CPM and Trinamul. Joint attack for tie-up failure OUR CORRESPONDENT, The Telegraph Pulin Goldar (left) of the Congress with his car and Jayanta Ghosh, a Trinamul leader, at Malbazar police station on Wednesday. Picture by Biplab Basak Siliguri, July 1: A failure to stitch up an alliance cost them dear — a realisation which hit hard many Trinamul Congress and Congress supporters who immediately joined hands to correct the wrong by attacking leaders of both parties. Members of both the parties assaulted their leaders in Malbazar and ransacked a vehicle after the Left Front won back the municipality in Jalpaiguri district after 10 years. The supporters blamed the alleged nonchalant attitude of their leaders at the local level for failing to enter into an alliance for the municipality polls despite pressure from the state leadership and the insistence of the common party worker. Of the 15 wards in Malbazar, eight went to the Left Front (CPM-5, RSP-1, CPI-1 and one to the Left Front supported Independent), four to the Congress and three to Trinamul. “It is because of the local Trinamul leadership that a total alliance could not be formed. We had to accept the defeat by only one seat,” alleged Biswaranjan Sarkar, the Jalpaiguri district Congress president. “We had accepted the formula of nine and six and had fielded candidates in only six wards. The Trinamul leadership, however, violated the agreement and fielded candidates in two of our wards apart from their nine.” Of these two wards, the Congress managed to win in one, losing the second to CPM. A mere difference of 15 votes in Ward 14 brought the CPM to power, feels Sarkar. Supratim Sarkar, the Left backed Independent in Ward 14, got 406 votes while Trinamul secured 391. In Ward 8 where both Trinamul and the Congress had fielded candidates, the CPM won by 52 votes. The Trinamul and Congress got 289 and 189 votes while the CPM secured 530. “had there been a tie-up, we could have won both the seats,” said Sarkar. When by 12 noon the results became evident, Trinamul and Congress workers started shouting abusive slogans against Gautam Deb, the chairman of the core committee of Trinamul in north Bengal. Soon, a mob gathered in front of the Trinamul office near Caltex More on NH31 and attacked Subhasish Ghosh, the Trinamul block president of Malbazar, and leaders Bapi Ghosh and Tutul Sarkar. Another group attacked the car of Pulin Goldar, a Congress leader. The protest continued till 3pm and stopped with the arrival of police. Around 4pm, Subhasish filed complaints against 11 persons, two of them are Trinamul candidates who won this time. Subhasish, however, refused to acknowledge that he was assaulted by his party workers. “Some so-called Congress workers and supporters had organised an attack on us,” he said. “It would be wrong to blame us for the results as the Congress, too, did not wholeheartedly support our candidates.” Deb said it was not the time for blamegame. “We need to get to the roots and identify the cause of defeat,” he said. Alipurduar marooned post-rain ;Statesman News Service JALPAIGURI, 1 JULY: Torrential rainfall (204 mm approximately) for the past 24 hours has left several Wards in Alipurduar municipality waterlogged. People in Ward nos 1, 9 and 16 in particular are almost marooned waiting to be rescued. Several houses in some of the municipal wards are partially under water. The heavy rain has raised water levels in the Kaljani, Garam, and Nonai rivers flowing in and around Alipurduar. The municipal councillor of Ward no 15 today distributed dry food among the affected people of the Ward. Twenty-five families of the ward were rescued by boat and were moved to a municipal flood shelter. The residents of the affected Wards are, however, blaming the poor drainage system of the town as the cause for water-logging. “Water-logging has become a regular feature in our Ward. The municipality has not attended to the town's drainage system for long and the residents are having to pay through their nose as a consequence,” alleged Mr Ratan Sarkar, a resident of Alipurduar. Rejecting the allegation, the Alipurduar municipality chairman, Mr Dipta Chatterjee said they had recently renovated several drains of the town. “Four pumps have been commissioned to pump out the stagnant water into the Kaljani River. We need a master plan for Alipurduar to eradicate the problem permanently,” the chairman claimed. Water has also accumulated at Hasimara, Hamiltonganj, Forwardnagar, Shayamaprasad Sarani, Bidhannagar and other places in Kalchini block following heavy downpour. The BDO Kalchini, Mr Puspak Roy said they were keeping a watch on the situation. GOVT HIKES PETROL- DIESEL PRICES 1Jul 2009, 1855 hrs IST, PTI : NEW DELHI: Days before the general budget, the government on Wednesday increased petrol and diesel prices by Rs 4 and Rs 2 a litre respectively effective midnight tonight, but spared kerosene and domestic cooking gas from a hike. "The hike was necessitated because of rising international crude oil prices which have doubled to $70 a barrel since December," petroleum minister Murli Deora told reporters here. The issue was not taken to the Cabinet, as is done generally, but Deora consulted party leadership and prime minister Manmohan Singh to decide on the hike. The decision would help garner Rs 13,000 crore this fiscal, although the oil companies were projecting a loss of Rs 39,000 crore before the hike. The decision comes ahead of the July 6 Budget. Parliament's Budget session is to begin on Thursday and clearly the government wanted to take a decision before that. The weekly Cabinet meeting is scheduled for Thursday. Deora said the government will not raise the domestic LPG and kerosene prices though the public sector oil companies are losing Rs 92.96 per cylinder and Rs 15.26 a litre respectively. After the increase, petrol in Delhi will cost Rs 44.62 a litre and diesel Rs 32.86 a litre. 3 PERSONS TEST POSITIVE FOR SWINE FLUE, TALLY 116 NEW DELHI PTI, JULY 1: Three persons today tested positive for swine flu, taking the total cases of H1N1 infection in the country to 116. The fresh cases were reported from Delhi, Bangalore and Gurgaon. The case in Delhi is that of a 11-year old child who travelled from Munich transiting Dubai and reaching Delhi on June 26. He was admitted to the identified health facility yesterday with cough and fever

In Bangalore, a 29-year old male passenger travelling from China was affected by the disease while in Gurgaon, an 11-year old child tested positive for the influenza. Of the 116 cases, 74 have been discharged. Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation has reported 70,893 confirmed cases of swine flu out of which 311 have died. Left cadres capturing areas near Lalgarh New Delhi, JUNE 1, Indopia, PTI Trinamool Congress chief and Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee today accused the Left cadres in West Bengal of capturing areas near Maoist-affected Lalgarh. "The CPI(M) (cadres) are going there on red motorcycles and scooters and capturing area,"she told media here. Asked whether TC cadres were visiting Lalgarh and nearby areas, she said no one from her party was going as CPI(M) (cadres) were moving in the area. " They (Left) are capturing one area after the other,"she added.Banerjee said 40,000 people have been displaced from the area and accused the Left Front government in the state of not delivering the goods. " People are fed up. They (government) have failed to deliver the goods,"Banerjee, whose party had an impressive performance in Lok Sabha elections in the state, alleged.

Fourth phase of operations begins in West Midnapore

Saibal Gupta., Indopia, PTI

Lalgarh, July 1 Accompanied by anti-landmine vehicles and bulldozers, two teams of security forces today marched toDharampur near here as operations to flush out Maoists from WestMidnapore district entered the fourth phase.

A team from Dherua to Dharampur was led by district SP ManojVerma and the other from Lalgarh to Dharmpur by DIG ( MidnaporeRange) Praveen Kumar.

The forces have so far covered about three fourths of the distance meeting no resistance from Maoists, who were earlier driven out of Lalgarh, Ramgarh and Kantapahari since the operations against them began on June 19, Kumar said.

The forces were accompanied by anti-landmine vehicles and bulldozers.

Kumar interacted with villagers en route to Dharampur. Most villagers complained that they were not getting the 6 kg of rice provided free by the administration as they did not have ration cards.

Assuring full cooperation, Kumar said"We are on a social policing mission. The job of police is not to instill fear but to make villagers realise that we are their friends. I assurance that no injustice will be done.