Ranaghat, April 21: In jeans and a full-sleeve cream shirt, Deben Biswas was moving from door to door when 85-year-old Jogesh Das dragged him to his house.

“Tui eshechhish (You’re here)? Come inside. Let’s see if you remember. You will get our vote only if you recognise us,” Das says, throwing a mischievous glance at Biswas.

The 61-year-old retired IPS officer fielded by the CPM in Ranaghat (East) looked like a lost child as Das referred to him as “little Deben” who would often visit this house with his father.

“Uncle, forgive me. I have forgotten everything. I have not been here for so many years,” an embarrassed Biswas told Das.

A batchmate of the late CPM state secretary Anil Biswas at Krishnagar Government College, Deben Biswas is the first retired bureaucrat ? he stepped down as the inspector-general of police (South Bengal) last year ? to be chosen by the party as a candidate.

Having been brought up in Ranaghat town, he’s very much a son of the soil. But there are some in this reserved (SC/ST) constituency who believe he’s a son who’s lost touch with the soil.

Riding a red Sumo and accompanied by about a dozen CPM supporters, Biswas campaigns in his mostly rural constituency, looking fit and trim in his casuals and Nike as he jumps off the car whenever it stops.

“He (Biswas) has spent too much time with the upper crust as an IPS officer to understand the problems of the scheduled castes and backward people. A person with a sound political background would have made a better candidate,” says Sampad Biswas, a teashop owner at Cooper’s Camp in Ranaghat, about 65 km from Calcutta.

Friend Anil Biswas had persuaded him to contest. Observers find several reasons for nominating a retired police officer. The area has seen a string of serious crimes recently and, as a result, the police are the butt of much criticism.

Samir Nag, a popular Trinamul Congress leader of the area, was murdered nearly three years ago. Neelima, his widow, is a candidate. Other than the obvious sympathy she enjoys, the sums are in her favour.

The CPM has been winning here since 1977, but from 1996 to 2001 ? when Asim Bala was the candidate ? the margin fell by more than half to 4,343 votes. In the Lok Sabha polls of 2004, the CPM’s Alakesh Das had trailed in Ranaghat (East) by about 7,000 votes.

The Assembly election follows in less than two years, too short a time for people to change their minds.

“Debenbabu has a hard struggle ahead,” said a Trinamul leader.

CPM sources said Bala was not renominated as he was close to an expelled local leader who was arrested in a rape and loot case.

“Anilda (Anil Biswas) knew there was infighting in the party and wanted to field a non-CPM face,” said a party leader.

Deben Biswas is that face ? he’s also the face of the crime-buster in a place where at least one party leader ? now expelled ? was picked up for an alleged crime.

The retired police officer now on an unfamiliar trail has another face. “I am a born communist,” he says, with a chuckle.