Author: Tara Shankar
Sahay in New Delhi
Publication: Rediff
on Net
Date: September 7, 2000
Trinamul Congress president
Mamata Banerjee's ambition to become chief minister of West Bengal could
well spur her to part company with the National Democratic Alliance headed
by Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, top intelligence sources have said.
In a confidential report
to Union Home Minister Lal Kishenchand Advani, intelligence officers posted
in Bengal said Banerjee had realised that she and her party stood to gain
much more by parting ways with the NDA.
The report says Banerjee
has asked her colleagues to be ready for any eventuality so that the Trinamul
is well placed to fight the Marxist-led Left Front government in the state.
According to the sources,
Banerjee's tantrums about the Centre not clamping President's rule in 'lawless'
West Bengal barely conceal her intent of ditching the NDA when it suits
her.
They pointed out that
over the last three weeks, the Trinamul chief has begun feeling that she
cannot become Bengal chief minister without the support of the Muslims.
Consequently, her complaints against the Vajpayee government have become
louder.
The sources said that
following submission of the report, Defence Minister George Fernandes,
acting as Vajpayee's emissary, tried to persuade Banerjee not to take any
hasty action that could destabilise the government. But she is understood
to have snubbed him, saying she too is bound by political compulsions.
This has caused anxiety in BJP circles.
Though Parliamentary
Affairs Minister Pramod Mahajan ridiculed any notion of the Trinamul leaving
the NDA government, he could not explain Banerjee's reported threat to
the BJP leadership that she would quit the Union Cabinet if her demands
regarding West Bengal were not met.
"Mamataji is very much
with us and there is no question of her leaving the government. Our
leadership has given her a patient hearing and I have no doubt that the
matter will be amicably settled," Mahajan said.
Trinamul politician Pankaj
Banerjee, however, pointed out that every party "has its own set of compulsions
and targets" and his party was obliged to meet the aspirations of the people
of West Bengal. "West Bengal naturally comes first," he remarked.
With the Trinamul throwing
a formidable challenge to the Left in Bengal, it does not seem likely now
that Banerjee will be satisfied with her earlier demand of having one more
Cabinet-rank minister in the central government.
Her constant refrain
that the government is not helping out even as the law-and-order situation
in Bengal is worsening, coupled with her prolonged absence from the Centre,
indicate that this time around, her regional ambitions may just get the
better of her aspirations at the Centre.