Lok Sabha elections 2019: Rahul Gandhi to take final call on Congress-CPI(M) pact in West Bengal

A large section of the Congress’s West Bengal unit leaders want a pre-poll pact with the Left parties, but are unwilling to give up their claim over two Lok Sabha seats the Communist Party of India (Marxist) currently holds, according to people aware of the developments.

Congress president Rahul Gandhi has been entrusted to take the final call on this, they added.He met a select group of Congress leaders from West Bengal in New Delhi on Wednesday to discuss the strategy ahead of the national polls due next month.

West Bengal has the most Lok Sabha seats – 42 – after Uttar Pradesh (80) and Maharashtra (48). The Congress and CPI (M), which led a ruling coalition in the state for 34 years until 2011, are struggling to regain lost their ground in West Bengal.

The ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) swept the Lok Sabha elections in the state in 2014 and won 34 of the 42 seats. The Congress won four while CPI (M) and the BJP, which is trying to make inroads into the state, two each. CPI (M) had offered a seat adjustment formula to Congress Monday. It proposed that the two parties leave the six seats that they currently hold for each other.

According to leaders present at the Wednesday meeting, Gandhi gave them three options. He told them they can either go for an informal tie-up with CPI (M) or a formal alliance or seat adjustment. Gandhi sought to know the preference of the state leaders.

The leaders told Gandhi an alliance will help the Congress but they should contest Raiganj and Murshidabad seats, which CPI (M) currently holds. CPI (M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury has sought Congress’s support for the Left candidates in the two seats.

Congress leaders insisted the Left has lost further ground in these two seats. The CPI (M) has argued the minority voters might shift to TMC if Raiganj parliament member, Md Salim, is replaced.

“We told Rahul Gandhi about the prevailing situation and that we can win back our traditional seats. He will take the final decision,” said Abdul Mannan, the leader of West Bengal’s Congress legislative party.

The leaders rejected any tacit understanding and emphasised that a poll pact must be formal and both parties must campaign together to defeat BJP. Yechury said the ball is now in the Congress’s court. “We have already made clear our intention.”

BJP’s West Bengal unit chief, Dilip Ghosh, said it does not really matter whether the two sides tie up or fight alone. “They have become non-entities in Bengal,” he said.