Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi's wife, brother in fight for supremacy in Raiganj

RAIGANJ (WEST BENGAL): An unfulfilled dream of former Union minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi, bedridden for the past six years, of setting up an AIIMS-like hospital here continues to dominate the election contest here between his wife and his brother in this constituency that has been a Congress stronghold since 1999.

Apart from being a three-cornered fight among Congress, Trinamool and CPI(M), nearly 14 lakh voters in this Lok Sabha seat tomorrow will be hard-pressed to choose between Deepa Dasmunsi (Congress) and brother-in-law Pabitra Ranjan Dasmunsi (Trinamool).

Sitting MP and Priya's wife Deepa, who is Union Minister of State for Urban Development, is also facing Left Front leader and CPI(M) candidate Mohammed Salim. BJP has fielded yesteryear's actor Nimu Bhowmick.

Deepa, a bete noire of Trinamool supremo Mamata Banerjee, and one of the vocal critics of Congress-Trinamool alliance in Bengal, time and again has lashed out against the state government on the issue of land for setting up of an AIIMS-like hospital here.

"She (Mamata) doesn't want AIIMS to come up in Raiganj that is why she is not acquiring land even if the farmers are willing to give it. It is cheap vindictive politics," Deepa has alleged.

On the other hand, Mamata is said to be against forcibly acquiring land from farmers for the over Rs 800-crore project that the Centre had okayed for the facility five years ago.

While in 2009 Lok Sabha polls Deepa rode the sympathy wave for her ailing husband and reaped the benefits of being the Congress-TMC alliance candidate as she won with over one lakh vote margin, political equations have undergone a sea change in the past five years.

Political observers say that with the anti-Left votes set to split this time as both Congress and Trinamool have fielded their own candidates, CPI(M)'s Salim will be the gainer.

The Raiganj constituency, situated in North Dinajpur district, has nearly 48 per cent Muslim population. It has been stronghold of Congress since Independence, except in mid 90s when Left's Subrata Mukherjee snatched it away.