Tough fight for FB to retain Cooch Behar Uttar seat

Cooch Behar town is known as the stronghold of the Congress for a long. Cooch Behar Municipality was a Congress-run body till the previous civic election. But, the Trinamul Congress is a partner in the existing municipal board. After delimitation of the Cooch Behar Uttar Assembly constituency the town has been excluded from this constituency.

In the previous two Assembly polls the Forward Bloc's candidate won from this seat. But after delimitation it is no more a safe one for them. Due to change of status of this seat from 'general' to 'reserve' the Forward Bloc fielded a new face to contest from this constituency.

In the previous two elections Mr Dipak Sarkar won from this seat defeating ex-MLA Mr Mihir Goswami (Trinamul Congress). In 2001, Mr Sarkar bagged 57,170 votes while Mr Goswami got 38,813 votes. In 2006, Mr Sarkar pulled 67,997 votes and Mr Goswami got 36,325 votes. This time it is difficult for the Forward Bloc to use the image of the outgoing MLA as a 'wind of change' is blowing all over. The leadership of the Forward Bloc however not ready to admit their fear and so they are expressing their confidence in wining the seat again with a new candidate from scheduled caste community.

Cooch Behar Uttar Assembly segment is made of 13 Gram Panchayat areas under Cooch Behar-II block. After two consecutive terms of Mr Dipak Sarkar, this time the Forward Bloc fielded here a new candidate, Mr Nagendra Nath Roy.

In 2006, twenty wards of Cooch Behar Municipality were also in this Assembly segment, but this time these wards have been excluded due to delimitation. Though the stronghold areas the Congress got excluded, the Forward Bloc is not in a happy mood. Because, as a whole the votes in favour the leftists are going down considerably in recent times. In 2001, Mr Sarkar had acquired 46.88 percent votes and in 2006 he got 48.40 percent votes. In the Lok Sabha election of 2009, the Left Front candidate bagged only 43.08 percent votes from this Assembly segment. In the three-tier panchayat elections held in 2003, the leftists were able to capture 12 Gram Panchayats out of 13 Gram Panchayats in this Assembly constituency area. But, in 2008 they were able to retain six GPs only. Though the influence of the leftists is decreasing in this area the Forward is not ready to admit it. They are trying to woo the voters by pointing out that the opposition-run panchayat bodies are not functioning well and transparently. As a result, the Forward Bloc candidate has a greater chance to win from this segment again.