Mamata Banerjee & Deepa Dasmunsi File Nomination From Bhowanipore

Bhowanipore: Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and former Union Minister Deepa Dasmunsi filed their nomination from Bhowanipore Assembly constituency on Friday.

A crowd of Banerjee’s supporters greeted her as she came out of the building after filing her nomination. Along with the two ladies, Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose’s grand-nephew Chandra Kumar Bose also filed his nomination from the same constituency.

Though Bhowanipore is a Trinamool stronghold, in recent times, party sources said that Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had been making strides in the area — particularly in urban locations.

After Mamata was sworn in as the Chief Minister in 2011, the then party general secretary and the CM’s trusted lieutenant, Subrata Bakshi, had vacated the Bhowanipore Assembly seat. In the consequent bypoll, Mamata won by a margin of 54,213 votes. Bakshi too won by 2,30,099 votes from the Kolkata South Lok Sabha seat that Banerjee vacated. In the 2015 Kolkata Municipal Corporation polls, Trinamool lost two — wards 70 and 77 — of the eight wards in Bhowanipore. While ward 70 was won by BJP’s Ashim Bose, ward 77 went to Forward Bloc’s Shamima Rehan Khatun.

Banerjee filed her nomination at 1 PM at Alipore Survey Building. Congress-Left Front alliance candidate from the same constituency, Dasmunsi also filed her nomination papers.

Previously, the Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee President Adhir Chowdhury had announced the name of party general secretary Om Prakash Mihsra as the candidate pitted against Banerjee from the Bhowanipore Assembly segment. However, the Central Election Committee of the Congress party later decided to field Dasmunsi against Banerjee.