BASHIRHAT: As Rekha Patra begins to address the crowd at the Basirhat District Sports Association Ground in West Bengal’s North 24 Parghanth district, she is greeted by deafening cheers of “Jai Shri Ram.” “I am running to ensure that what happened in Sandeshkari does not happen anywhere else in West Bengal. Will you vote for me?” she asks. The crowd replies with thunderous “Yes” and tapping sounds.
Till a few months ago, she had little to do with politics, but since January 5, the whirlwind that has engulfed Sandeshkari, a tiny island village in the Sundarbans region of West Bengal, has thrust her into the political vortex — or, to be precise, into the core of the BJP’s campaign for the Lok Sabha elections in the state.
“I seek your votes so that Mamata Banerjee’s goons cannot grab anyone else’s land,” added the BJP candidate from Basirhat Assembly constituency. Later, Leader of Opposition in the state Assembly and party stalwart Suvendu Adhikari took to the microphone to assure the audience that arrangements are in place to ensure voter safety if Trinamool Congress “goons” try to intimidate or disrupt voters on Saturday, when voting goes ahead in Basirhat and eight other Assembly constituencies in the state.
“Haji Nurul Islam (TMC candidate from Basirhat) is a ‘dangabaaz’ (insurgent)…If he wins, he will only expand his illegal business empire without doing anything for the common people,” Adhikari warned.
Sandeshkari (one of the seven constituencies in Basirhat LS constituency) came into the limelight after a mob attacked the house of local TMC leader Sheikh Shahjahan after a team of Enforcement Directorate officials raided it in connection with an investigation into alleged irregularities in the Public Distribution System.
This followed protests by locals against illegal land grabbing by Sheikh Shahjahan and his aides. After allegations of sexual harassment emerged against the gang, women came to the forefront. The BJP acted quickly to gain political advantage from the situation and selected Rekha, who was then known as the face of the protests, as its candidate from Basirhat.
Sheikh Shahjahan remained absconding for nearly two months before he was arrested by the state police on February 28 and handed over to the CBI.
“I felt as if I was talking to Sri Ramchandra himself,” Rekha says, recalling the call he got from Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself just days after he was announced as the BJP candidate. “We will present Basirhat to Mr Modi and make him prime minister again.”
The assertion that the illegal business empire and reign of brutality run by Sheikh Shah Jahan in Sandeshkari was no stranger to Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee fits perfectly with the BJP’s election campaign narrative that she and her party were pursuing a policy of appeasement.
The saffron party also tried to use the sexual harassment allegations against Sheikh Shahjahan and his close aides to weaken the TMC’s support base among women, whom the Mamata government had turned into its most dependable vote base with welfare schemes like ‘Kanyashree’ and ‘Lakshmir Bhandar’.
The BJP also deployed Sandeshkari women to various constituencies in the state to campaign against the TMC.
Modi and other Bharatiya Janata Party heavyweights have repeatedly raised the issue of Sandeshkari’s atrocities against women throughout the party’s two-and-a-half-month campaign for the West Bengal elections. The prime minister called Rekha “Shakti Swarup” and “Bahadur Beti” while canvassing for votes for her at a rally on Tuesday.
“Your sister, your daughter’s integrity cannot be sold for Rs 2,000,” Rekha told the audience at a rally in Basirhat, citing several videos that surfaced online earlier this month and mocking the TMC’s attempt to claim that the women’s protests, particularly the sexual harassment allegations against Sheikh Shahjahan and his entourage, were staged by the BJP.
Published May 31, 2024 01:14 IST
