Political violence has claimed at least 15 lives in Bengal in the past month since the election results were declared, and several more may gave gone unreported. At least half of the victims are Left Front sympathisers; five are from Trinamool Congress (TMC) and at least one person is from the BJP. While the TMC alleges a Left-BJP conspiracy to target its supporters, the Left accuses the other two of working in unison.
However, what is evident is the fact the each group is trying to establish its dominance in areas they identified after the results, and the violence is an outcome of this campaign. The sudden surge of the BJP — it led in 20 and came second in 21 of the 294 assembly segments in May — has added a new dimension to politics in the state, as the saffron party appears determined to build on its gains and the TMC, to stop it.
Though the BJP has lost its deposit in 136 of 294 Assembly segments, the party’s rise in one-sixth of the segments was enough to force the TMC to undertake ‘area domination exercise.’
On the other hand, BJP has stepped up its activities in the State on two fronts. The party started dispatching “a-team-a-week” to do their own fact-finding of the violent incidents, annoying Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
It has also started wooing the Muslims, the traditional vote base of TMC, by holding “all Muslim rallies” in the cities, unheard of in Bengal, and by enrolling members of the community. A team led by senior leader Balbir Punj was formed to exclusively probe the death of party activist Rahim Sheikh. What particularly annoyed Ms. Banerjee was BJP’s report to Union Minister Rajnath Singh where the party accused TMC of spreading terrors using “Islamic groups”. “BJP is here to disturb the communal harmony in the State,” she charged.
Other than the murders, hundreds of people have been injured and forced to leave villages, houses were torched, women molested and farmers were told not to reap the harvest.
