The farmland where the state's industrial fortune was stated to make a turnaround is deserted. The farming activities post removal of the small car unit are a poor apology to the crop fields that stood here once.

It belies the promise of the then fiery Opposition leader Mamata Banerjee to restore the green fields. Small wonder, TMC nominee Rachana Banerjee is loath to raise it in her election campaign speeches as she is aware that she has no answers to most of the questions of those who supported the agitation against the small car factory.

But perish the thought if anyone is under the impression that Singur is a forgotten chapter. Neither BJP candidate and sitting MP, Locket Chaterjee nor Congress supported CPI(M) candidate, Monodeep Ghosh are sparing any effort to remind the people that TMC has jettisoned Singur. Hoogly constituency goes to the Lok Sabha polls on May 20.The campaign had been widespread five years ago. Coupled with the Modi wave it saw political lightweights in the saffron camp emerge victorious against heavy odds.

Leading in five Assembly segments in 2019 Lok Sabha election, Chatterjee, a film star and the BJP nominee emerged victorious with a margin of 70,000 odd votes. Five years hence the TMC think tank read Mamata Banerjee has pitted Rachana Banerjee who anchors "Didi number one” on small screen in which the chief minister herself had been interviewed before the list of the candidates was announced.

The TMC nominee is a known face to the legion of those who look forward to her show every week. On the other hand, post 2019 election, Chatterjee being busy in Parliament and various roles at the national level of BJP, could not give time to the grievances of the people in her area. The TMC nominee Rachana who was heroine in many of the films with Locket Chatterjee as co stars in the last decade, is making that absence of the present Lok Sabha member as the main campaign point. The TMC nominee assures that if elected, she will always be available for the people of her constituency.

Meanwhile, Singur remains a piece of almost a fallow land. In her campaign speeches the BJP candidate lays the blame at Trinamool's door aiming the twin charges of grounding the state's industrial revival and not restoring the erstwhile small factory land to a green crop field.

Coupled with it is the infighting among local TMC leadership with corruption charges doing the rounds which had strengthened BJP's campaign. A clutch of social security schemes especially the women centric ones like Lakshmir Bhander, Rupasree, Kanyasree and fielding a fresh candidate from the glamour world is sought to offset the infighting and inaction over Singur issue.

But central probe agency arresting Santanu Bandyopadhyay and Kuntal Ghosh in cash for teaching jobs case has magnified the corruption charges. Both the BJP and the CPI(M) has targeted It in their poll campaigns.

Appealing to the "political consciousness" of the Hooghly voters, both the poll opponents of the TMC candidate are honing their campaign. There is no reason for the people to be deprived of 100 days work remuneration and the Union government's housing scheme owing to corrupt and slipshod practices of Trinamool functionaries, it was alleged.

Furnishing her "report card" of doing .more Rs 17 crore worth of projects , the BJP candidate counters charges of being away from her constituency. She however cannot deny infighting in the saffron district unit.

But all the seven Assembly segments of Hooghly are represented by TMC legislators. It gives a strong wind in Banerjee's sails, besides being a pointer that the ruling dispensation has recovered the support base it had lost since 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

Meanwhile, both the CPIM) and the BJP nominees feel by keeping the Singur issue in limbo, the TMC have betrayed the people's faith which helped catapult the latter to power. They hope that the plot which was promised to be tilled after the small car factory was pulled down will be a "smoking gun" for the TMC on May 20, the election day.

In the adjoining constituency at Srirampur, the battle between TMC candidate Kalyan Bandyopadhayay, three times Lok Sabha member from that seat has attracted attention due to the family quarrel between the father in law and his former son in law KabirSankar Bose of BJP. The outcome of a legal battle between an advocate and a barrister ( who is also an advocate) is anybody's guess. But in the backdrop of the organisational strength and extent of support base, in electoral battle at Srirampur odds seem to be against the barrister, BJP candidate Kabir Shankar .

Despite having won thrice in succession from Srirampore, the allegation of having a rough tongue sits on Bandopadhyay. Instead of denying it, he says this is a part of his nature which has been overlooked by voters of this constituency whose support ensured his victory on three previous occasions.

Of late, Bandopadhyay has been in the news for the wrong reasons. He forced Uttarpara TMC MLA and actor Kanchan Mallik to get down from the campaign vehicle on the plea that the latter's personal life was drawing jeers from the village women folk.

Incidentally, Bandopadhayay is not close to Abhishek Banerjee, the unofficial number two in the party who was not keen on the Srirampur MP being given nomination. But the party supremo brushed aside such objections and reiterated her trust on him. Bandopadhyay is dismissive of both his political opponents. A gulf of age and experience sets him apart from the duo.

Moreover, Bose had lost to TMC nominee DrSudipto Roy in the Assembly elections for Srirampur. It puts a question mark on his acceptability among the wider section of voters of this Lok Sabha.

No stranger to electoral politics, Congress supported CPI(M) nominee Deepsita Dhar makes up the third angle of this triangular electoral battle. National joint secretary of SFI, Dhar, a research scholar in Jawaharlal Nehru University is a part of her party's experiment to bring in young leaders to the front ranks.

Though charge of dynastic politics is yet to be raised by either Bandopadhayay or Bose, the CPI(M) candidate is also known by the deeds of her grandfather, Padmanidhi Dhar who had won thrice in succession from Domjur Assembly segment. And even as this Left student leader campaigns hard in her debut political battle, she has not taken leave of humour drawing parallels between her TMC rival and a silver screen character-Mr India.

Accusing Bandopadhayay of being an absentee MP, the CPI(M) nominee says in a lighter vein that he is an invisible person just like Mr India. Rubbishing her charge, the TMC candidate refers to her as Miss Universe.

But hilarity departs as the three candidates hurl charges at each other. Citing high rate of joblessness emanating from closure of factories including Duckback, Hindustan Motors, Dankuni Coal complex both the BJP and the CPI(M) candidates ask about Bandopadhyay's role in reopening the units in his 15 year tenure as a MP

Dhar has sharply criticised the role of the Trinamool in the case of alleged sexual assault on some Sandeshkhali women folk in Basirhat. Taking the charges in his stride, Bandopadhayay said subsequent incidents have raised doubts on the veracity of the sexual assault charges while most of the industrial units downed shutters in the Left Front regime.

Comfortable with the support of seven party legislators in as many Assembly segments, Bandopadhayay will also have to contend with Indian Secular Front nominee, Shahriyar Mallick. The TMC nominee appeared unfazed though his ISF electoral rival is likely to get some votes from the minority voters belt at Champdani and Chanditala. (IPA Service)