CALCUTTA DIARY-Come November Or Don t

CALCUTTA DIARY Come November: Or Don't Flibbertigibbet BENGALI intellectuals have long prided themselves, with only limited factual basis, that their city, Calcutta, resembles Paris in its argumentative fervour and artistic vigour. Then came the recent student and workers' riots in Paris and other French cities. A Bengali intellectual happened to be in London at the time; and he lost no time at all in suggesting that students in Paris were only emulating the students of Calcutta. Another writer in Calcutta gave the palm to the students of Djakarta. "Sir", as Dr Johnson said, "there is no point of precedency between a louse and a flea". While in West Bengal today, in spite of the imminence of the November midterm poll, that about sums up the electorate's attitude towards the Congress and the United Front, the two main contestants, if the United Front does not disintegrate and the Congress maintains its facade of unity, there are many other straws in the wind which resemble conditions in Paris in the last few gasping months of the Fourth Republic