Once a Goliath-feller, Mamata is no longer David

What would David be without a Goliath? It was because David felled Goliath (all 9 feet 9 inches of him) that the story becomes the stuff of legend. So it was with Mamata. Time and again, the David in Mamata felled the more powerful and the larger. First, it was the Goliath in the form of CPI(M) and the Left Front, and Mamata-David achieved her dream of becoming chief minister of West Bengal. Next, with her 21 seats in Parliament, Mamata-David partnered a new Goliath, the Congress party, to form a stable UPA. Many times since the famous partnership, Mamata-David dared to stand up to the Goliath-Congress, and, time after time, we saw the Goliath-Congress buckle with fear. [caption id=“attachment_466389” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  PTI[/caption] Till the Congress called her bluff. She threatened the Congress one time too many, and, rather than buckle down, they chose to walk away from the battle, leaving Mamata-David with her slingshot, all ready for battle, ready to shoot down the Goliath-Congress. Too bad, this time, Goliath just walked away, leaving David all alone and with no battle to fight. Battles between equal are no fun; they fail to entertain, to engage or to inspire. It’s the stories of the French Resistance fighting against the brutality of the Nazis that make for the most romanticised stories, it’s the story of Mahatma Gandhi challenging the British empire, the story of Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King that make them heroes. They were all Davids, fighting their fights against many Goliaths. In cartoons, we want Tom, the Goliath-cat, to lose to Jerry, the David-mouse. A gun-wielding Elmer Fudd cannot be bettered by Bugs Bunny or Daffy Duck. Beep Beep the Road runner bests the Coyote every time. During the FIFA World Cup, millions across the world rooted for David-Cameroon when they play. What is Batman if there was no master-mind in The Joker? That’s the opportunity Mamata has lost. Till the act of withdrawing from the UPA, Mamata was David, and everybody loves a David. Today, she has no Goliath to aim at, no Goliath to be bracketed with. Just as mice other than Mickey are just mice, Mamata, now, is just another woman politician. No one will notice her.