KOLKATA: Neither the ruling Left Front nor the two Opposition parties — the Trinamool Congress and the Congress — could improve their tally in Saturday's by-elections in three Lok Sabha constituencies and one Assembly constituency in West Bengal, the results of which were announced on Tuesday.

This despite a covert alliance between the Trinamool and the Congress.

The Congress retained the Malda Lok Sabha seat.

By retaining Bongaon, the Trinamool regained its status as a recognised Opposition party in the Assembly, where it now has a total of 30 seats — the minimum number required for such recognition in the 294-member House.

The seat had fallen vacant following the death of a Trinamool MLA.

But the Trinamool-Congress agreement, on the basis of which neither party put up candidates against each other, failed to affect the Left's fortunes in the Katwa and Purulia Lok Sabha constituencies.

The CPI(M) retained Katwa and the All-India Forward Bloc, Purulia.

In the April-May Assembly elections, the two Opposition parties could not come to a similar agreement to prevent a division in the anti-Left vote.

Now the Left Front has won the seats even though it was a one-to-one fight, said Left Front committee chairman Biman Bose.

The result in Malda showed that the Congress strongman A.B.A. Ghani Khan Choudhury, whose death necessitated the by-election, is still held in high regard in the constituency.

His brother, A.H. Khan Choudhury won the seat, though the victory margin was less than what Ghani Khan Choudhury registered in the last polls.

By defeating the CPI(M)'s Sailen Sarkar, State's Parliamentary Affairs Minister, the Congress registered its ninth successive win in the constituency.

Congress president Sonia Gandhi thanked Trinamool leader Mamata Banerjee over telephone for helping in her party's win in Malda, a senior Trinamool leader said.

"People's mandate"

Asked to comment on the outcome of the by-elections Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, said: "It is the people's mandate; they have given their verdict in our favour in two constituencies and against us in the other two."

Congress for long term strategy

New Delhi Special Correspondent reports:

Buoyed by the success of the Trinamool Congress in the by-elections for the Malda Lok Sabha seat and the Bongaon Assembly seat, Congress leaders have revived the talk of the need to have a long-term electoral strategy with Mamata Banerjee's party in West Bengal.

Though the results of the Saturday by-polls saw the Congress and Trinamool retaining the seats, a sense of elation was over the fact that a clear understanding between the two parties would be mutually beneficial.

Expressing happiness over the results, All-India Congress Committee general secretary Margaret Alva, in charge of party affairs in the State, saw it as a turning point for the party in West Bengal.

Unlike the April-May Assembly elections, when the Congress did not have any understanding with the Trinamool, in these by-polls the party left some seats for Ms. Banerjee's party.

Meanwhile, Union Minister Priyaranjan Dasmunsi too welcomed the outcome and was of the view that the party should work out its strategy, possibly with the Trinamool, to take on the Left parties ahead of next year's panchayat polls.

The pro-Trinamool Congress camp in the Congress is bound to make yet another attempt to forge a formal act with Ms. Banerjee's party.

During the Assembly polls, there was no agreement between the parties since the Congress insisted that the Trinamool Congress should snap its ties with the Bharatiya Janata Party before it could enter into a pact with the Congress in West Bengal.

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