CALCUTTA, 18 April 2004 — Nafisa Ali went to Mamata Banerjee’s home and was blessed by the Trinamul Congress leader’s ageing mother in a coup of sorts.
And Moushumi Chatterjee told the old warhorse, Ajit Punja, that if he was really her fan, he should campaign and vote for her.
Media hype and lighter moments aside, both the glamour girls of yesteryears fielded by the Congress party high command to take on the Trinamul Congress’ big guns, Mamata Banerjee and Ajit Punja, are in dire straits.
While Nafisa Ali, former beauty queen-cum-actress-cum-social activist, is pitted against the redoubtable Mamata in the Calcutta (South) Lok Sabha seat, Moushumi Chatterjee, the fading Bollywood-Tollywood heartthrob, is in the fray against veteran MP Ajit Panja in Calcutta North-East.
But Congress party cadres and middle-level leaders have deserted the glamorous candidates who are desperately trying to make the best of a bad situation. Party workers and the local leaders describe the two women as New Delhi’s “imposition”. They say they were not sounded or consulted. So why should they canvas for them?
The glamour girls were nominated at the expense of local Congress leaders whose candidature was almost finalized. Their names were suddenly struck off aborting their carefully nurtured plans to shine as giantkillers. Rebuffed by Congress workers, Nafisa has fallen back on the NGO network to seek votes and spread her message in the sprawling constituency where her rival is a household name.
Wherever she goes in quest of votes, Nafisa is accompanied just by a handful of party faithfuls, including an English-speaking Mahila Congress activist specially deputed by Congress heavyweight Somen Mitra.
Nafisa, being an activist, is coming to terms with the unexpected situation but Moushumi looks like a fish out of water without the party machinery she was banking on to beard the lion in his den.
Moushumi’s strategy is to appeal to her fans to vote for her. She has no organizational backing. There is not a single experienced poll manager to guide her. With nobody to hold her hand, she looks lost and is often clueless.
Chandrima Bhattacharya, a Mahila Congress worker, was the party’s first choice for the Calcutta (North-East) seat before Moushumi was suddenly roped in.
And Nafisa was nominated at the cost of Partha Roychowdhury who was greedily eyeing the Calcutta (South) constituency for months. But his hopes were dashed.
West Bengal Congress boss Pranab Mukherjee admitted that there was a lot of resentment against fielding “outsiders” but he defended the AICC’s decision to inject glamour into the party’s campaign.
