Didi goes national, first stop Uttar Pradesh

By Alka Pande Stepping out of West Bengal, the Trinamool Congress has decided to enter the poll fray in five states—Goa, Manipur, Punjab, Uttarkhand and Uttar Pradesh—and making a move in this direction it has declared the list of 49 candidates for the first phase of elections in the state of Uttar Pradesh. The polling for the first phase would be held on 8 February. “Out of 55 seats which would go to poll in the first phase, names for 49 seats have been announced,” said SB Singh, the TMC national coordinator for the five states. The party has also announced its electioneering committee under the chairmanship of Ram Nihor Rakesh, a former MP from Allahabad district. The convenor of the committee is Rai Singh, a former bureaucrat whereas the co-convenors are Bhagwan Singh and Arshad Khan, both former MLAs from Uttar Pradesh.[caption id=“attachment_181356” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“State secretary Mritunjay Mishra stands in front of the All India Trinamool Congress office in Lalbagh, Lucknow. Alka Pande”]  [/caption] TMC has no base in the Hindi heartland, where caste politics rules. However, a few, aspiring to make their way in politics, have congregated here to give a structure to state unit of Trinamool Congress in Uttar Pradesh. The recently set up office of the party functions from a 10 by 10 feet room in Lalbagh—a busy and congested area of Lucknow—the capital city of Uttar Pradesh. The building has been named Trinamool Congress Bhawan. Outside the office a huge poster displaying the picture of the party chief Mamata Banerjee, announces the presence of TMC in the state. Inside, the pictures of Mamata along with portraits of writer/poet Rabindra Nath Tagore and Mahatma Gandhi adorn the walls of a dimly-lit office. A young boy can be spotted sitting in a corner typing something on a computer, while the seniors sit at the other desk. In the state unit apart from the state president Anup Chowdhary, who came from Kisan Congress to join TMC in 2009, there are two general secretaries, Shiv Shankar Patel and Sachin Yadav. While Patel deserted Mayawati to follow Mamata, Yadav is an advocate by profession. Besides there are about half a dozen secretaries, who are not only pining hopes on the state assembly polls for their own political future but are giving hopes to others as well. “Leave your biodata elaborating upon your area, work and experience and it will be sent across to Delhi along with a few others for the selection of candidates for the next phases of election,” Yadav advises a man who came from the Bahujan Samaj Party with a hope to get the ticket from the TMC. The office-bearers are full of enthusiasm. “Uttar Pradesh election will prove to be a testing ground for us. The results will explain where we stand and will also be a decisive factor for our future strategy,” says Shiv Shankar Patel, flashing out his visiting card, which boldly states his designation as the state general secretary of All India Trinamool Congress. “I had a desire to do something. Everyone knows how the BSP functions, therefore, I joined the TMC,” says Patel who claims to be with TMC since 2010. According to him, the state executive of the party has been formed and the cadre from state to village level too, was in place now besides 1.25 lakh members have been formally enrolled in the party in Uttar Pradesh. “There would have been more members had we launched the membership campaign but we did not get the permission to do so,” laments another party member, not disclosing his name. “The members we could make were only through youth membership campaigns,” he added. The reason why the state unit was not permitted to run the membership campaign gets clear when this correspondent called the TMC office in Delhi, where the leaders denied the very existence of any office or executive in the state, though they didn’t rule out that some party workers in their overenthusiasm might have set up makeshift TMC headquarter in Uttar Pradesh. “Right now we do not have any office in Lucknow and there are no office-bearers appointed by us or any committee recognised by us in Uttar Pradesh,” says Sultan Ahmad, the Union Minister for State for Tourism and the national general secretary of Trinamool Congress. Ahmad is also the in-charge of Uttar Pradesh. He goes on, “It is too late for appointing the office-bearers as the war has already been declared. Now is the time for the electioneering committee which has been announced.” According to him, the people in Lucknow must be the workers of the party who have made their own set up and put the party flag and banners.