{"id":18822,"date":"2014-03-14T09:51:20","date_gmt":"2014-03-14T04:21:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/?p=18822"},"modified":"2014-03-15T16:58:48","modified_gmt":"2014-03-15T11:28:48","slug":"6-reasons-why-anna-mamata-alliance-was-a-non-starter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/politics\/6-reasons-why-anna-mamata-alliance-was-a-non-starter","title":{"rendered":"6 reasons why Anna-Mamata alliance was a non-starter"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_18942\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-18942\" style=\"width: 665px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/politics\/6-reasons-why-anna-mamata-alliance-was-a-non-starter\/attachment\/mamata-anna\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-18942\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-18942\" alt=\"Mamata - Anna\" src=\"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/ci-moi-images\/my-india\/mamata-anna-1024x1024.jpg\" width=\"665\" height=\"665\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/ci-moi-images\/my-india\/mamata-anna-1024x1024.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/ci-moi-images\/my-india\/mamata-anna-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/ci-moi-images\/my-india\/mamata-anna-300x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/ci-moi-images\/my-india\/mamata-anna-665x665.jpg 665w, https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/ci-moi-images\/my-india\/mamata-anna-32x32.jpg 32w, https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/ci-moi-images\/my-india\/mamata-anna-64x64.jpg 64w, https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/ci-moi-images\/my-india\/mamata-anna-96x96.jpg 96w, https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/ci-moi-images\/my-india\/mamata-anna-128x128.jpg 128w, https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/ci-moi-images\/my-india\/mamata-anna.jpg 1600w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 665px) 100vw, 665px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-18942\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Mamata &#8211; Anna<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>So we know that Anna Hazare and Mamata Banerjee\u2019s brief political courtship has come to a screeching halt. If the joining hands of these two leaders were dramatic,\u00a0the eventual fallout was nothing short of anti- climax. <em>Didi<\/em>, much to her dismay, found a near deserted Ramleela Maidan with veteran social activist bailing out on her last moment. The joint rally was hurriedly wrapped up with Mamata giving call for <em>ekla chalo<\/em> (will venture alone). How it will\u00a0impact the TMC leader\u2019s political ambitions is a matter of speculation which only time can tell. But let us find out the reasons for which <em>didi<\/em> and Anna combination was always a non-starter.<\/p>\n<p>Firstly, India is not Anna, Anna is not India. It may have been briefly during the heady days of JanLokpal Bill agitation, but he is now merely a shadow of himself. Team Anna is now only Anna and group of motley followers. Hence, he was unable to attract any crowd leading to the scanty footfall. Mamata Banerjee in her zeal to gain national acceptance probably overestimated the strengths of Anna. While Anna wanted to pillion on <em>didi<\/em>\u2019s popularity, she was hoping for the same. The\u00a0end result was\u00a0fiasco.<\/p>\n<p>Secondly, Anna is confused. Who says only teenagers in love are? Betrayed septuagenarians can be equally perplexed. First, he said that he will never join politics; next, he said he will support clean candidates from all parties. Finally, facing political irrelevancy, Anna lent his weight to TMC. But from a maverick leader like Anna, a flip-flop was only a matter of time.<\/p>\n<p>Thirdly, in politics &#8211;\u00a0like in physics &#8211;\u00a0the theory of like poles repelling often holds true. Both these two leaders are known to be personally honest and upright people. But it is widely reported that they also have an authoritarian streak. They are not known to be people who enjoy sharing space with a parallel power centre. Thus an ego clash was probably inevitable. It was hardly likely that two very strong headed personalities can forge up an alliance avoiding bleak future.<\/p>\n<p>Fourthly, Mamata\u2019s political stars are on the ascendant, while Anna is a spent force. Sooner or later, she would have understood the futility of this alliance. Thus Anna probably deserted Mamata, before she can.<\/p>\n<p>Fifthly, <em>didi<\/em> had vehemently protested against JanLokpal Bill earlier. While both tried to play down that difference, the bogies of that controversy refused to bow down. Many NGOs reached out to Anna questioning the rationality of his actions. In the final calculation, Anna may have been swayed by <em>Didi<\/em>\u2019s blatant objection to his pet project.<\/p>\n<p>Sixthly, there has been always a shadow of BJP\u2019s interference in Team Anna\u2019s movement. Two of her trusted aides have finally aligned with the saffron outfit. Gen V.K. Singh even met Anna on Wednesday morning, hours before Anna fell \u201csick\u201d. Did BJP sabotage the start-up even before it took off? The facts strongly indicate towards that.<\/p>\n<p><strong>PostScript<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>A section of pundits though believe whatever be the reason, this isn&#8217;t actually bad for TMC in the long run. Sure, the hopes of TMC\u2019s national ambition have been jolted for now, but it also gives them a chance to focus on Bengal. People like Deve Gowda or I.K. Gujral were no national leaders. Yet they reached the top office. If TMC can get 30 + seats, in a classic hung parliament, Mamata Banerjee can become a consensus candidate of the third, err&#8230;, federal front. But as of now, the fact remains that after the presidential election again Mamata\u2019s goal of \u201carriving\u201d in the national scene has got an immense jolt. Maybe she would be more careful the next time onward.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Related Information<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/who-is-who\/government-politics\/mamta-banerjee.html\">Biography of Mamata Banerjee<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/parliamentaryconstituencies\/\">General Elections 2014<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/parliamentaryconstituencies\/results.html\">Election Results<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/parliamentaryconstituencies\/westbengal\/\">West Bengal Election<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/parliamentaryconstituencies\/westbengal\/general-election-results.html\">West Bengal Election Results<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/parliamentaryconstituencies\/delhi\/\">Delhi Elections<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/parliamentaryconstituencies\/delhi\/general-election-results.html\">Delhi Election Results<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>So we know that Anna Hazare and Mamata Banerjee\u2019s brief political courtship has come to a screeching halt. If the joining hands of these two leaders were dramatic,\u00a0the eventual fallout was nothing short of anti- climax. Didi, much to her dismay, found a near deserted Ramleela Maidan with veteran social activist bailing out on her [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1305,"featured_media":18942,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11315,3],"tags":[3912,3964,4590],"class_list":{"0":"post-18822","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-india","8":"category-politics","9":"tag-anna-hazare","10":"tag-general-elections-2014","11":"tag-mamata-banerjee"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18822","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1305"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18822"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18822\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18942"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}