Action replay?

An advertisement in a Hindi newspaper in Kolkata has caused much heartburn in the state unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Through the ad, around 300 prominent Marwari residents of Salt Lake city have appealed to their community to vote for the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) in the Bidhannagar municipal polls. It was with the support of this community, representing 32 per cent of the voters in the Bidhannagar belt, that the BJP had trumped TMC in the Bidhannagar municipality in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls. Since then, organisational issues hit the party hard and it failed to win any of the 90-plus municipal boards in the state civic polls this April. Six months on, a repeat performance in the Bidhannagar municipal corporation polls looms large.