Mamata: Job for Jaitley

New Delhi, Feb. 15: As the helicopter doors open, out steps Mamata Banerjee with folded hands. On the campaign podium, the soft-spoken leader is the soul of reasonableness.

It could happen if the BJP’s suave lawyer, Arun Jaitley, can sell his idea of a “suitable” chief minister candidate to Bengal’s firebrand Didi.

The BJP has handed Jaitley, its overseer for the Bengal elections, the job of giving the Trinamul Congress chief an image makeover, BJP sources said.

Jaitley has advised Mamata to tone down her usual shrill rhetoric in favour of a more “rational” approach.

“If you compare the two personalities ? Buddhadeb and Mamata ? he certainly gives the impression of being a more reasonable person, a more suitable candidate,” a party insider explained. “The NDA (National Democratic Alliance) has to change that perception if it wants to make any impact.”

Jaitley also wants Mamata to change her style of decades and hop across the state in a chartered helicopter.

“There is no reason why Mamataji should not be provided with a helicopter,” he said. “It only adds to her efficiency. She can address 10 meetings in a day. She is a very effective campaigner and we should try and supplement her efforts.”

Being the poll manager who had got Uma Bharti to the chief minister’s chair in Madhya Pradesh, Jaitley should know a thing or two about sprucing up the images of firebrand ladies. He, however, refuses to make comparisons.

“Mamataji is a far more honest individual,” is all he would say.

Whether or not the Madhya Pradesh experience proves handy in dealing with the Trinamul chief, Jaitley is banking on the lessons of the Bihar polls ? for which he was the BJP’s main strategist ? to tackle the Congress.

Jaitley is credited with having taken the bottom out of Ram Vilas Paswan’s campaign. He got the NDA’s chief minister candidate, Nitish Kumar, to keep inviting “kingmaker” Paswan.

“We knew that Paswan would never do that because he had to keep his ministerial berth at the Centre. By constantly inviting him to fight against Lalu Prasad, we wanted to neutralise his anti-Lalu rhetoric,” a BJP leader explained.

The party plans a repeat with the Congress in Bengal.

“By getting Mamata to invite the Congress, we want to neutralise its anti-Left postures in the state. There is no way the Congress would join the mahajot against the Left if it has the BJP as one of its constituents,” a BJP source said.

“But by refusing to join the anti-Left alliance, the Congress will only make its campaign look like an exercise in shadow-boxing.”

Whether or not the strategy works, the Bengal election may have just got a bit more entertaining.