Kolkata, April 7 BJP's Barrackpore constituency candidate Arjun Singh, who is candid about his switching parties, is aiming to repeat victory in the Lok Sabha polls.
Arjun Singh, who was Trinamool Congress legislator from Bhatpara Assembly constituency, one of the seven constituencies under Barrackpore Lok Sabha, joined the BJP before the 2019 polls and also successfully contested from Barrackpore.
However, in 2022, when he re-joined the Trinamool Congress, his comeback period was not smooth as he faced tremendous opposition from a couple of local party legislators from his party.
Probably keeping that infighting in mind, Trinamool Congress did not re-nominate Arjun Singh this time and instead fielded state Irrigation Minister Partha Bhowmik, who is also the legislator from Naihati, one of the seven assembly constituencies under Barrackpore Lok Sabha.
Irked by the denial of re-nomination, Arjun Singh again went back to the BJP and also managed re-nomination.
Arjun Singh is quite candid about the reasons that prompted him to go back to the BJP.
"When I re-joined Trinamool Congress in 2022, I was promised re-nomination from Barrackpore. Then before the nomination, the ruling party leadership wanted me to field me from elsewhere. I denied it since Barrackpore is in my roots. Still I was hopeful. But ultimately when the party chose not to re-nominate me, I had no other option but to go back to BJP," Arjun Singh said.
Partha Bhowmik is using this statement of Arjun Singh against him in his campaigns.
"So frequent shift to political camps results in loss of credibility for any politician and the people of Barrackpore will make Arjun Singh realise that this time," he said.
Arjun Singh's counter-argument is that such observations are not acceptable from a party like Trinamool Congress whose leadership is habitual in taking back turncoats.
"There are so many examples of Trinamool Congress leaders joining the BJP before the 2021 West Bengal assembly elections and subsequently going back to the ruling party fold after the polls. Some of them going back to the ruling party even got elected as BJP legislators in the 2021 polls," Arjun Singh argued.
Although Arjun Singh got elected in 2019 from Barrackpore, his winning margin was not that high which can be reverted considering the strong organisational base of Trinamool Congress at Barrackpore.
In 2019, Arjun Singh defeated Trinamool Congress' Dinesh Trivedi by a margin of 14,857 votes, which political observers feel is not that big a margin that cannot be recovered especially in a highly volatile constituency like that of Barrackpore.
Actor-turned-politician and CPI(M) candidate Debdut Ghosh is also in the poll fray.
Debdut was the CPI(M) candidate from the Tollygunge Assembly constituency in Kolkata in the 2021 polls but was defeated.
According to Ghosh, he is banking on absolutely free and fair polls under strict monitoring and the consolidation of the dedicated left vote bank in this erstwhile red bastion for a miracle.
Barrackpore, once a thriving industrial belt in North 24 Pargans district because of the predominance of jute and engineering factories there, is currently considered the hub of closed and sick industries in the state. The constituency has a predominantly Hindi-speaking population.
Barrackpore, with a voter strength of around 15 lakh, was traditionally a red bastion between 1989 and 2009, with the voters there electing CPI(M)'s Tarit Baran Topdar for six consecutive terms.
The equation changed in 2009 with Trinamool Congress; Dinesh Trivedi getting elected defeating Topdar. Trivedi got re-elected in 2014 as well. However, the equation changed again in 2019, with Arjun Singh emerging victorious as a BJP candidate.
Barackpore, an industrial hub in the North 24 Parganas district of West Bengal, is expected to witness a three-cornered contest in the upcoming elections.
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