On the 5th of March, the Trinamool Congress released a list of 291 candidates for the upcoming West Bengal Assembly elections.
Mamata Banerjee, the Chief Minister of West Bengal announced the candidates list for the 294 member West Bengal Assembly elections. The highlight of today’s announcement is Ms. Bannerjee contesting the Nandigram Assembly constituency.
Key points from TMC’s announcement:
During a public meeting, Ms. Banerjee and other TMC leaders addressed the media and briefed about the candidate’s list.
Battleground Nandigram West Bengal is likely to witness a royal fight between Mamata Banerjee and BJP’s Suvendu Adhikari in Nandigram.
Ms. Banerjee addressed the media and said, “I am going to Nandigram on March 9. On March 10, I will file the nomination at Haldia.”
The battle between Suvendu Adhikari and Ms. Banerjee would be tough, as recently Mr. Adhikari switched party and joined the BJP.
Mamata said that Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay will be contesting from her home turf of Bhowanipore.
This time, there are 50 women candidates, 42 Muslim candidates contesting the elections.
In addition, 79 candidates are of the Scheduled Castes (SCs) and 17 are the Scheduled Tribes (STs.)
Ms. Banerjee said, “On three seats of north Bengal, we are not putting up our candidates. In three seats – Darjeeling, Kalimpong and Kurseong – Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM) will contest the elections and whoever wins will support us.”
She said that 23-24 existing TMC MLAs have been dropped due to age and other reasons. Ms. Banerjee said, “After we come to power we will create Vidhan Parishad to accomodate senior and experienced leaders. We could not accommodate everybody especially those above the age of 80 years.”
While releasing the candidate’s names, the West Bengal Chief Minister urged the supporters to have faith in her and asserted that only TMC can take West Bengal to new heights.
Ms. Banerjee also openly dared the BJP, which is being seen as TMC’s principal opponent this year, saying that she is not afraid of the challenge. She said, “Amit Shah and Narendra Modi can send as much force as they want, still TMC will win the elections.”
Highlighting some candidates, TMC’s candidates are actor Kanchan Mallick, who had joined the Trinamool Congress a few days back, from Hooghly’s Uttarpara; Soham Chakraborty from Chandipur; director Raj Chakraborty from Barrackpore; actress Sayantika from Bankura; actress June Malliah from Midnapore sadar; actress Sayani Ghosh from Asansol south; cricketer Manoj Tiwari from Howrah’s Shibpur and Kaushani Mukherjee from Krishnanagar north assembly constituency.
pposition unity
Despite being a three-cornered contest, the TMC supremo said that several opposition parties have rallied behind her party to give a strong fight to the BJP.
Ms. Mamata said that after RJD, SP and Shiv Sena, the TMC has also received support from JMM.
“I thank Tejashwi Yadav, Arvind Kejriwal, Hemant Soren and Shiv Sena for extending their support to me,” Banerjee said.
West Bengal will go to polls in eight phases from the 27 of March to the 29th of April.
Thee results of the West Bengal Assembly elections would be declared on the 2nd of May.
