The threat of agitation in Darjeeling district has temporarily receded. But West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has had a dig at the Congress for stirring up discontent. The one Lok Sabha seat in Darjeeling is in the hands of BJP MP Jaswant Singh who is openly with the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM). According to Mamata Banerjee, the local Congress is playing politics to wrest the seat. She said that her party would not forgive any organization which overtly or covertly supported Gorkhaland. She attacked Congress MP Deepa Dasmunshi who led a GJM agitation to meet President Pranab Mukherjee and Union Home Minister S.K. Shinde in Delhi recently. The tables seem to have been turned. Mamata Banerjee had been accused of being soft on the GJM, cozying up with its leader Bimal Gurung and recognizing the label “Gorkhaland” in forming the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration. The Congress had always been opposed to bifurcation of the state. It may be recalled that Priya Ranjan Dasmunshi had signed a joint accord with the then West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee opposing Gorkhaland and the Trinamul Congress had abstained. It flies in the face of reason that the West Bengal Congress would diminish its stature supporting the demand for Gorkhaland and get close to the BJP.
Mamata Banerjee rightly argued that a separatist movement would not go down well with the people and that tribal groups in the area might trigger riots. She spoke of development projects in the hills, Dooars and Terai though these are still very much in the air. Banerjee had recently made a turnaround threatening a crackdown as GJM supporters had attacked some Trinamul leaders in the region. She is now trying to go soft after the suspension of the agitation. But, GJM leaders have refused to meet her as her popularity in the hills has dimmed. The plot thickens.