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11 new faces in Left list for Bengal

There are 11 new faces in the ruling Left Front's list of candidates for the general election in West Bengal. But State Chief Minister Jyoti Basu does not find a place in the roster of nominees.

Releasing the list of candidates for 41 of the 42 seats on Tuesday, Left Front chairman Sailen Dasgupta said the Front had not yet selected its candidate for the Calcutta North West seat.

Dasgupta said the seat was given to the Janata Dal during the last election, but the Front had not received any proposal from the Dal this time. He said the Forward Bloc was interested in fighting the Calcutta seat, but the Front was yet to take a final decision.

He said there was no move to make Basu a candidate for the election. The United Front had made an attempt to make Basu prime minister in May 1996. But his party, the Communist Party of India-Marxist, rejected the proposal saying it would not join the government, but support the Front from outside.

Among the new faces are the mayors of Calcutta and Howrah, Prasanta Chatterjee and Swadesh Chakraborty respectively and former state health minister Prasanta Sur.

While Chatterjee and Chakraborty will contest the Calcutta North East and Howrah seats respectively, Sur, who did not contest the last assembly and Lok Sabha elections, will vie for the Calcutta South seat, where Trinamul Congress leader Mamata Banerjee is the sitting candidate.

Dasgupta said the Front had also replaced R B Rai, its sitting member from Darjeeling and brought back veteran Ananda Pathak. Rai and Tamang Dawa Lama, a Rajya Sabha member, have been expelled from the CPI-M for anti-party activities.

He said the Forward Bloc had nominated Chitra Ghose for the Barasat seat in place of veteran leader Chitta Basu, who died last year.

The other new candidates are Minati Sen (Jalpaiguri), Jiban Moitra (Malda), Abul Hasnat Khan (Jangipur), Mainul Hassan (Murshidabad), Bikash Chaudhury (Asansol) and Nikhil Sar (Burdwan).

Among the prominent sitting members, who were dropped this time, were Haradhan Ray of Asansol and Jiten Ray of Jalpaiguri.

The following is the list of candidates:

Constituency Proposed candidate Party 1. Cooch Behar (SC) Amar Roy Pradhan Forward Bloc

2. Alipurduar (ST) Joachim Bakla Revolutionary Socialist Party

3. Jalpaiguri Minati Sen CPI-M

4. Darjeeling Ananda Pathak CPI-M

5. Raigunj Subrata Mukherjee CPI-M

6. Balurghat (SC) Ranen Burman RSP

7. Malda Jibon Moitra CPI-M

8. Jangipur Abul Hasnat Khan CPI-M

9. Murshidabad Mainul Hassan CPI-M

10. Berhampore Promatha Mukherjee RSP

11. Krishnanagar Ajoy Mukherjee CPI-M

12. Nabadwip (SC) Asim Bala CPI-M

13. Barasat Chitra Ghose FB

14. Basirhat Ajoy Chakrabarty CPI

15. Joynagar (SC) Sanat Mondal RSP

16. Mathurapur (SC) Radhika Ranjan Pramanik CPI-M

17. Diamond Harbour Shamik Lahiri CPI-M

18. Jadavpur Malini Bhattacharyya CPI-M

19. Barrackpore Tarit Baran Topdar CPI-M

20. Dum Dum Nirmal Chatterjee CPI-M

21. Calcutta North West to be decided

22. Calcutta North East Prasanta Chatterjee CPI-M

23. Calcutta South Prasanta Sur CPI-M

24. Howrah Swadesh Chakrabarty CPI-M

25. Uluberia Hannan Molla CPI-M

26. Serampur Sudarshan Roy Chaudhury CPI-M

27. Hooghly Rupchand Pal CPI-M

28. Arambag Anil Basu CPI-M

29. Panskura Gita Mukherjee CPI

30. Tamluk Lakshman Seth CPI-M

31. Contai Sudhir Giri CPI-M

32. Midnapore Indrajit Gupta CPI

33. Jhargram (ST) Rupchand Murmu CPI-M

34. Purulia Birsingh Mahato FB

35. Bankura Basudeb Acharya CPI-M

36. Bishnupur (SC) Sandhya Bauri CPI-M

37. Durgapur (SC) Sunil Khan CPI-M

38. Asansol Bikash Chaudhury CPI-M

39. Burdwan Nikhil Sar CPI-M

40. Katwa Mehboob Zahedi CPI-M

41. Bolpur Somnath Chatterjee CPI-M

42. Birbhum (SC) Ramchandra Dom CPI-M

EARLIER FEATURE:
'In politics there are moments when you have to rise
to the occasion and you've got to cater to the need
of the hour and the pleas of the people'

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