Despite championing the cause of the fairer sex,the Left parties in West Bengal have left only two of the state's 42 Lok Sabha seats for women candidates. Compared to it,Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress has allotted maximum number of five seats to women. Among the left parties,only the CPI-M has nominated two women while it is an all-male affair for its other constituents like CPI,Forward Bloc and RSP. The marxists have re-nominated its two sitting MPs - former athlete Jyotirmoyee Sikdar from Krishnanagar and Susmita Bauri from Bishnupur (SC) constituencies. The party has dropped its sitting MP from Jalpaiguri Minati Sen and fielded Mahendra Roy from the seat. Apart from party supremo Mamata Banerjee who was seeking re-election from the prestigious Kolkata South constituency,Left's main rival Trinamool Congress fielded four women aspirants to try their luck at the election. Kakali Ghose Dastidar,the party's women wing chief,was contesting from Barasat seat which TC had lost by a narrow margin in the last Lok Sabha poll. Trinamool's sitting MLA Ratna Nag has been fielded from Hooghly while Siuli Saha would contest from Bishnupur.It has also fielded Bengali cine actor Shatabdi Roy from Birbhum. The names of two women candidates have so far figured in the list of nominees announced by Congress which had entered into seat sharing with TC. Under the pact,TC will contest 28 seats leaving 14 to Congress. Congress has so far declared names of 11 nominees which included the names of Deepa Dasmunshi,wife of ailing union minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunshi from Raigunj in North Bengal and Nargis Begum from Burdhaman-Durgapur constituency. The party was likely to put up another woman from the newly-created Malda North constituency since there were recommendation for two names-Mausam Benazir Noor and Sabitri Mitra,both sitting MLAs. BJP which did not have significant presence in the state was contesting almost all the 42 seats after TC snapped its ties with the party and gave tickets to three women. Its candidate Jyotsna Banerjee will fight it out with TC chief Mamata Banerjee in Kolkata South. Other two women candidates of BJP were Polly Mukherjee (Howrah) and Rajashree Chowdhury (Tamluk). Left gives little representation to women Kolkata,Mar 17 (PTI) Despite championing the cause of the fairer sex,the Left parties in West Bengal have left only two of the state's 42 Lok Sabha seats for women candidates. Compared to it,Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress has allotted maximum number of five seats to women. Among the left parties,only the CPI-M has nominated two women while it is an all-male affair for its other constituents like CPI,Forward Bloc and RSP. The marxists have re-nominated its two sitting MPs - former athlete Jyotirmoyee Sikdar from Krishnanagar and Susmita Bauri from Bishnupur (SC) constituencies. The party has dropped its sitting MP from Jalpaiguri Minati Sen and fielded Mahendra Roy from the seat. Apart from party supremo Mamata Banerjee who was seeking re-election from the prestigious Kolkata South constituency,Left's main rival Trinamool Congress fielded four women aspirants to try their luck at the election. Kakali Ghose Dastidar,the party's women wing chief,was contesting from Barasat seat which TC had lost by a narrow margin in the last Lok Sabha poll.
