On the eve of the Darjeeling parliamentary poll, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee took a very sensible stand. She drove home the point that she was firmly opposed to the division of the state. The Left is at one with her, the Congress is ambivalent and the BJP supports small states. Mamata Banerjee urged the people to vote for the TMC candidate, Baichung Bhutia, a soccer maestro. She said that Gorkhas who guarded the country need not be afraid and that she wanted a free and fair election, instead of rigging and dictatorship which prevailed there earlier. She was not double-faced like the BJP which said different things in the hills and plains. Banerjee emphasized that the bond between the plains and the hills would remain. She regretted that the Gorkha Janmukti Mocha (GJM) wanted the Gorkha Territorial Administration (GTA) but had not run it efficiently. The funds were being looted though they were meant for the people. She spoke of the development work for the last two and a half years and promised a special package for the hills.
While Mamata Banerjee talked sense, there are a lot of obstacles in the way. For one thing, why she selected a candidate like Baichung is a mystery. He was a football icon but is from Sikkim and has little identification with the Darjeeling Napalis. Secondly, Mamata had always harped on her good relations with the GJM but now it had turned against her. The GNLF under Subhas Ghisingh is a spent force and its alliance with the TMC may not help very much. Mamata has created problems for herself with her dithering in the past two years.