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West Bengal Assembly Election: CPI(M) mulls seat-sharing proposal with Congress
The central leadership of the Congress is yet to receive any formal proposal from the Bengal unit on the alliance with the CPI (M)
The Communist Party of India’s (Marxist) Central Committee (CC), its highest executive body, will discuss a proposal for a seat pact with the Congress for the next year’s West Bengal assembly elections amid mounting pressure from its state unit about such a tie-up.
The 94-member CC will meet on Friday and Saturday (October 30 and 31) to discuss the proposal for a seat-sharing agreement. The move comes after the CPI(M) and other Left parties have been a part of a similar pact with the Congress and the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) in the upcoming Bihar polls.
Two senior Left leaders said the CPI(M) politburo, the party’s highest body that met on Sunday, held a preliminary discussion on the issue and the matter was referred to the CC.
Meanwhile, the central leadership of the Congress is yet to receive any formal proposal from the Bengal unit on the alliance with the CPI(M), a party functionary said.
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He said the talks are in progress at the state level and the central leadership would take up the alliance issue after the Bihar polls, which end on November 7. The state unit, especially its chief Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, is keen on an alliance with the Left parties in the next year’s assembly elections.
The CPI(M) and the Congress have joined hands for several protests and public programmes against the Mamata Banerjee-led government in Bengal. Chowdhury’s appointment as the state unit chief of the Congress also strengthened the prospects of an electoral tie-up between the Left and the Congress.
Chowdhury is a staunch critic of Banerjee and nurtures an agenda against her party, the Trinamool Congress (TMC).
However, the CPI(M) leadership will wait for a green signal from the Congress after its bitter experience in last year’s parliamentary elections.
The CPI(M) had unilaterally announced its willingness for a seat pact, but the Congress didn’t settle for an alliance in last year’s Lok Sabha elections.
The parties fought the elections separately, and the Left parties failed to win a single seat from Bengal, once its political fortress.
A CPI(M) leader said, “Let us see if the Congress camp is interested in a pact. We will discuss a proposal for a pact as we can’t enter into a full-fledged alliance on ideological grounds.”
The last party Congress of the CPI(M) had barred any alliance with the Congress or any such party.
