For residents of this sub-divisional town, Congress candidate Debaprasad Roy, better known as Mithu, will always be their man in Delhi.
“If something needs to get done at the Centre, it is Mithuda we must turn to,” says Palash Roy, a shop owner.
Palash’s faith ? and it is shared by most here ? is not without basis. People have seen Mithuda’s work spell magic, be it in changing the alignment of the East-West Corridor to the alternative one passing through the town, or in setting up the Jalpaiguri Circuit Bench and the Jalpaiguri Tea Auction Centre.
Debaprasad is well aware of his reputation, and when it comes to blowing his trumpet, he doesn’t beat about the bush. “I feel like a tree among saplings and weeds. Everybody is eager to come under the shade,” sums up the Congressman who is associated with a number of NGOs.
Born and brought up in Jalpaiguri, Debaprasad bypassed the state Congress to become the Rajya Sabha MP from the district and gain recognition as someone who wields considerable influence at the Centre. A trusted aide of Union information and broadcasting minister Priya Ranjan Das Munshi, Debaprasad’s star has been on the ascent ever since the Congress came to power in Delhi in 2004.
Observers feel his image as a man above the party will see him through in the May 8 polls.
No wonder all this makes the sitting MLA, Gobinda Roy, uneasy. The Forward Bloc leader seems overly cautious as he hastens to clarify that nobody has contested the booklet listing his achievements in the past five years. But his party supporters know he “cannot match the profile of the Congress leader” either in magnitude or importance.
“Debaprasad is in a different league from Gobinda Roy,” a CPM supporter says on condition of anonymity.
At some point, of course, sheer arithmetic takes over. The constituency comprises the Jalpaiguri civic area and eight village panchayats. Since the last Assembly elections, 16 of the 25 civic wards and half of the eight panchayats have gone to anti-Left forces.
However, anti-Left forces do not mean the Congress alone. Trinamul Congress’s Purnaprabha Mondal can put paid to Debaprasad’s plans.
Last time, Trinamul candidate Anupam Sen had lost by a slender margin of 2,582 votes ? though the Congress had supported him ? mainly because the BJP’s Dwipendranath Pramanik polled over 4,000 votes.
At Sarkarpara, Pramanik’s village located a stone’s throw from the India-Bangladesh border, the BJP leader’s face lights up when reminded of his feat. The man in his mid-thirties claims his party can bag around 10,000 votes in the constituency. He adds that the Congress can ill afford to ignore this huge vote bank.
“But it can only be a give-and-take arrangement. The Congress cannot expect to lap up all the cream. If they want a favour from us in Jalpaiguri, they must be ready to make electoral adjustments in our favour in other seats.”
The key to the poll result is believed to lie in South Berubari. Gobinda hails from Manikganj there, but residents feel it is Debaprasad who will have a bigger say in its future.
The area, spread across several panchayats, is caught in the web of international politics. Its southern part was included in East Pakistan through the Nehru-Noon agreement of 1958. This was overturned by the Indira-Mujib agreement of 1974, which is yet to be enforced.
To ensure the southern tip of South Berubari finally becomes a part of India, strings have to be pulled at the Centre. And where the Centre is concerned, voters cannot look beyond their Mithuda.
