Two residual questions :
(a) LF still polled 41% of the popular votes in an election that everybody agreed has been conducted in a fair and acceptable manner. The overall vote percentage all over the state has significantly increased. As usually reticent and even cynical voters might have exercised their votes this time, young newly eligible voters, without either the ideological baggage or a political opportunism, hatred and vendetta, carried their weightage too in a critical balance flipping game, did the LF at all derive any benefit out of this surge ? If not, this 41%, not a small number by itself, represents a solid unwavering support base for the left parties. What do they expect from the parties they had supported even under these hostile conditions probably at great personal risks (validated by the daily events of bloody vendetta by the ruling party supporters) ? The left parties should humbly reach out to this natural resource if they have to survive politically or otherwise.
(b) To say that the vote against LF played a bigger role than the vote for TMC/Congress combine is no-brainer. However, there must have been some key expectations of both the traditional anti-left constituencies in the state and the sizable ‘adjustable’ segment of voters (who played the arbiter of the election results) from a new government formed by an alliance of parties and colourful individuals who were so far known for their demagoguery, hate speech and pandering to perceived persecution and injustice rather than articulating a coherent policy for the economic renewal of all sectors of the state. What are the changes these sections expect the government to initiate ? Accelerating liberalisation and industrial development (and not touching the interests of the peasantry ) ? Rejig the land relations in favour of the dominant farmers with political clout at the cost of share croppers and labourers, especially those painted with a colour remotely resembling red ? Replacing your favourite cultural and educational elites with a set of mine ?
Such questions must await detailed unbiased analysis of the facts and trends to be unfolded in future.
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