Ground Report: Mamata ‘Teacher’, ‘Sherni’– At Opposition Rally

“We will find a leader to be PM”, thundered Mamata Banerjee. “PM Modi needn’t worry”, she said.

The opposition unity rally was Mamata Banerjee’s first move on the 2019 election chessboard. Mr. Modi, it’s your turn now.

(Photo: Aroop Mishra/The Quint)

Anybody who has been a witness to the Trinamool’s previous rallies in Kolkata would not call the state of the city on 19 January ‘unusual’. From as early as 6 am – in fact even earlier – truckloads of people were making their way into the city.

All of them enthused to a point of lunacy. Sloganeering till their voice gave away.

There was something different about this rally, though. The streets were lined with posters of all the leaders that were supposed to come. There were extra levels of security – drone camera, CCTVs et al.

Entering through the “media” gate, I was stopped because I didn’t have a state government accreditation. (They don’t issue those to the digital media.)

“Where have you come from, Madam?”, asked the guy at the gate.

“My head office is in Delhi”, I said, making sure that I was not lying but only stating the half-truth.

Immediately, I was let in. The “national media” must be allowed. That was the diktat from the high-command.

Didi-The Teacher

Now the Trinamool is known for their crowd management and their supporters are known to brave all kinds of adversities to hear their supreme leader speak. This time, though, their patience was running a little short. Maybe because of all the Hindi, English and occasional Tamil that was being spewed on stage.

An hour into the event, the crowds seemed to get restless.

But it seemed like that was something Mamata was anticipating. She was the emcee for the event. The anchor – literally and figuratively – and, hence, came some borderline funny instructions on the mic from time to time.

Like the first instance, when she informed the crowd that none of the buses that ferried them to the location would go back before 4 pm.

“Hence you’re stuck here and no amount of moaning and groaning will help” was what was left unsaid.

Then when the crowd got really restless, she could be heard saying: “Hey you there in the green shirt. And you in the ash grey jacket. Get down from the barricade! I can see everything.”

The cherry on the cake, though, was when she said something that I’d only heard my class teacher in school say when the Principal was doing rounds.

“These people are our guests. We need to show them how disciplined the chele-meye (boys and girls) of Bengal are!”, she coerced.

Then added, that she is going to be ‘L-A-S-T’ (yes, she spelt it out) speaker and so everyone must be patient.

They were satiated, though, when Shatrughan Sinha took the stage. He was clearly the second-most favourite person after Mamata.

Didi- The Sherni

On stage, however, everything seemed to be going as planned.

First up were the naujawans from Gujarat – Hardik Patel and Jignesh Mevani who received thunderous applause from the crowd.

They were followed by the leaders from the North-East – Lalduhama and Gegong Apang – who spoke about the NRC and the Citizenship Amendment Bill, while intermittently heaping praise on the Trinamool Supremo.

“We are confident that the leader who could transform West Bengal in such a short period of time, can lead the country too”, said Lalduhama, leader of the Zoram People’s Movement, the principle Opposition party in Mizoram.

Yashwant Sinha and Arun Shourie, quite cryptically, called for “one candidate” against the BJP.

“Up until now there was one person uniting the Opposition – Narendra Modi. But now that Bengal’s sherni has taken the initiative, it will definitely gain fruition,” Shourie said.

MK Stalin went one step further and said this:

“There are few people Modi is scared of and Mamata Banerjee is one of them. Modi-Shah are scared of stepping into Bengal soil.”

MK Stalin at the Opposition Unity Meet

It was sone pe suhaga when Kharge took the stage and read out a message from Sonia Gandhi.

Each address by a leader was followed by Mamata’s analysis and comment on their speech, before she invited the next speaker.

After Chandrababu Naidu called for a similar meet in Amravati, Mamata reminded many of TV journalists as she shoved the mic into Arvind Kejriwal’s face and asked, “You also want to do something like this in Delhi, don’t you Arvind?”

A laughing Kejriwal agreed.

The First Move On The 2019 Chessboard

When she finally took to stage after all the leaders were done talking, Mamata began in a convoluted mixture of Bangla, Hindi and English.

“Aapne (Modi) Akhilesh ko nahi choda, Tejaswi ko nahi choda, Arun Shourie, Kejriwal kisiko nahi choda. Aapne mereko bhi nahi choda. Toh hum aapko kyun chodein?” she thundered to smiles and rapturous applause from those sitting on stage.

“Don’t worry, Tejaswi”, she continued, “They have put Lalu ji behind bars. When they vanish, we will see who saves them.”

She also laid to the rest rumours of tensions between her and other so-called ‘PM faces’ of the United Opposition.

“They say we don’t have leaders. Look at the number of senior leaders on this stage! We don’t have leaders?! Throw the BJP out. We will figure out who can become Prime Minister. Modiji does not need to worry”, she said.

Finally, she ended the day with her favourite slogans and a rendition of the national anthem by the Bengali film industry that is omnipresent in all her rallies.

Anyone who was there at the Brigade Parade Ground would agree that on the 2019 Chessboard, Mamata Banerjee has made the first move.

Your turn now, Mr. Modi