V-P Election: The TMC And The Other Parties Are Giving Totally Opposite Versions Of What Went Wrong
By A Special Correspondent
First publised on 2022-07-23 15:23:49
About the Author
The TMC
says it was not consulted before the joint opposition candidate Margaret Alva's
name was announced for the vice-presidential election. Several Congress
leaders have said that Mamata Banerjee had assured Sonia Gandhi that since she
did not have any name in mind, she will go with whoever the other parties
jointly nominated.
The TMC
says that the party was informed just 20 minutes before the press conference in
which Alva's name was announced. Several opposition leaders have said that Sharad
Pawar tried to contact Banerjee when the meeting to discuss the name for the
vice-presidential candidate was in progress but was informed that she was busy
in a meeting. They said that they waited for half an hour before taking the
decision as Banerjee could not be contacted.
It is also being
alleged that Mamata Banerjee had met Jagdeep Dhankhar (who was governor of
Bengal then) in Darjeeling just a day before his name was announced as the NDA
nominee. It is also being alleged that BJP leader and Assam chief minister
Himanta Biswa Sarma was also present. Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Choudhary has accused the TMC of having a pact with Dhankhar.
So who is
right and why did this situation arise?
It is
obvious that if Mamata Banerjee had assured Sonia Gandhi that she would support
any name that the opposition jointly decides, she should have supported Alva.
Also, if the TMC wanted to have a say, the party should have sent someone to
attend the meeting. Further, the party has not denied that the opposition
leaders had tried to contact Banerjee when the meeting was in progress. It is
difficult to decide the sequence of events and judge who is right.
But
whatever happened should not have happened. This sends out wrong signals about
opposition unity and allows the BJP to paint the opposition parties as
organizations that do not have national interest at heart but just want to protect
their home turf. There must be greater coordination among the opposition
parties because the common 'enemy' they are fighting against is a monolith that
is not going to be displaced by weak jabs. It will need persistent and solid
upper cuts which the opposition, given its present state, is looking
increasingly incapable of delivering.
