Krishnanagar, June 4: Both Trinamool Congress and BJP retained their Lok Sabha seat on Tuesday which the two parties won in the 2019 general election.
While the expelled Trinamool MP Mahua Moitra has been re-elected from the Krishnanagar seat, BJP’s Jagannath Sarkar emerged victorious in Ranaghat despite his party falling far from its expectations in the state as well as at the centre.
In Bengal, till the report last came in Trinamool Congress candidates were leading in 29 seats, while the BJP was in 12 and the Congress in the remaining one.
The results of the Lok Sabha elections announced on the day reflected a poor show by the BJP-led NDA, which is so far leading in only 292 seats.
The INDIA block has come up with 233 seats putting the BJP in a tough situation to form the next government at the centre. The BJP despite its claims failed to emerge with a two-third majority. Mamata Banerjee termed the BJP’s result as its “moral defeat” claiming that the people have taught the BJP and Narendra Modi a great lesson. She also demanded the resignation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah.
Riding the anti-Modi wav Trinamool’s Mahua defeated BJP’s Amrita Roy by 56705 votes. However, BJP candidate Jagannath Sarkar won by 190000 votes defeating Trinamool’s Mukutmani Adhikari in Ranaghat.
Mahua, who has always been vocal against the NDA government, and particularly against Narendra Modi, was expelled from Lok Sabha last year in a ‘cash for query’ case. Trinamool re-nominated her to avenge the humiliation. On Tuesday a beaming Mahua said, “I salute to the people of Bengal for reposing faith in Mamata Banerjee and to me as well. I am very happy today> they have rejected this dangerous party…the BJP”. Mahua after victory expressed her gratitude to the people and Mamata Banerjee in a post on her X handle.
Thank you Krishnanagar, thank you @mamataofficial thank you INDIA pic.twitter.com/PIUUulcRq2
— Mahua Moitra (@MahuaMoitra) June 4, 2024
In 2019, Mahua won from Krishnanagar defeating BJP’s Kalyan Choubey by 63218 votes, riding on the Muslim support base which consists of around 25% of the electorate in the constituency with around 55% in some of the assembly segments. This time too, the Muslim dominated Chapra and Kaliganj helped her to sail through apart from her campaign strategy that smarty projected the Bengal government’s social welfare schemes.
On the other hand Jagannath Sarkar, despite the strong anti-Modi wave, managed to win for the consecutive second time due to the support of the Matua vote bank. Ranaghat constituency has around 35% Matua and downtrodden Namashudra votes bank, who have once again reposed support to the BJP apparently for the fulfillment of the Citizenship promise.
On March 11, the centre announced the notification for implementation of the CAA rules. Since May the home ministry began issuing the citizenship certificates based on the application submitted through the designated portal by the religiously persecuted people who entered India from neighboring countries like Bangladesh.