Deepa Dasmunsi to take on Mamata

2016 polls: Before sting op, Cong leaders were reluctant to fight CM

Making a significant change in its list of candidates, the Congress pitted former party MP Deepa Dasmunsi against Trinamool chairperson Mamata Banerjee from Bhawanipore on Friday.

Party leaders believe Deepa will be able to provide the necessary fight needed to stall Mamata’s march, insiders said.

While releasing its list of candidates a week back, the state party unit had announced that party’s state spokesperson Om Prakash Mishra would take on Banerjee who won the seat in 2011.

Congress sources claimed that the decision to field Deepa from Bhawanipore was taken by party president Sonia Gandhi.

Congress state president Adhir Chowdhury, who released a second list of 51 candidates on Friday, adding to the list of 52 last week, announced the decision  and said that the decision was taken after consulting the party’s central election committee. “We are announcing her name after getting the clearance from central leadership,” he said.

While Chowdhury had announced Mishra’s name as candidate on March 8, the turn of events took Mishra by surprise. Stating that the situation is “killing campaign time”, he told reporters, “I’ve been acting according to instructions of the state president. All this confusion is bringing in lot of negative publicity.”
 The sudden change in decision must have been brought about since a controversial video surrounding top Trinamool leaders surfaced, he said.

Mishra pointed out that before the sting operation surfaced no one came forward to take on Mamata. “I was the only one who volunteered to contest against her.
In the last 48 hours there have been some developments that renewed the energy of our leaders and workers, who now feel ready to fight Banerjee,” he told reporters.

He added that since Deepa is a resident of the neighbouring Rashbehari constituency, she should have been fielded form there. Deepa, who earlier refused to contest the election, told reporters that she is in the fray “only because the central leadership wants”.

Deepa, wife of former Union minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi, was earlier the party MP from Raigunge in North Dinajpur, the home seat of her husband since 1999. She lost the seat to CPM’s Md Salim in 2014.

Sources said that Deepa will fight with the aim to redeem herself, invoking the name of Dasmunsi, who has been in coma since 2008.