In the cacophony of whether the state will have a vegetarian/non-vegetarian chief minister, whether Union home minister Amit Shah will sample some the state’s famed meat and fish dishes as urged by the ruling party and when a whole fish becomes a door to door campaign prop, it is easy to forget that we Bangalis are more than what we eat. Also by the way, we do have some killer vegetarian fare; but that is a conversation for another time.This inherently inane discourse couches the more dismal reality of Bengal today – a state with the highest child marriages in the country, where educated and uneducated are forced to leave the state in search of livelihood and school dropout rates are appalling. Politics thrives on doles – that way at least we are no different from any other part of the country – and a cadre for which doing the dirty jobs of the party in power (irrespective of colour) is a profession not a passion.Therein also lies the answer to why politics in the state is so violent – change of guard threatens livelihoods and people are willing to die for (or against) it. The supply chain of this cadre is fed by unemployment and lack of education.These are not one but a herd of elephants in the room. But instead of a substantive conversation about the ills that plague the state that have fundamental implications for its future, we are subjected to a conversation that at best belongs to a roadside adda, if at all.At almost 18% WB’s dropout rate is significantly higher than the national average of 14%. Between 2022-23 and 2023-24, it more than doubled, according to data share in the Rajya Sabha. Linked to this and despite the once much flaunted Kanyashree scheme, National Family Health Survey 5 (2019-2021) estimated that 42% WB women in the 20-24 years age bracket had got married before attaining the legal minimum age of 18 years. Under Kanyashree families are given a small stipend for every year that girls are in school and then a lump sum cash once she turns 18 to help with her wedding.In districts like Murshidabad, Birbhum and Paschim Medinipur the survey estimated that over 50% women had been married off as minors; even Kolkata, the state capital has 17% child marriages. Anandabazar Patrika, the state’s largest circulated Bangla daily recently did a front page piece on the problem but political parties have chosen to look the other way.Migration, climate change all lost on a plateFarm distress, we hear, is a pan India phenomenon. Why is it then, that a disturbingly high proportion of domestic helps, rickshaw pullers and blue collar workers hail from one state? Why do we hear nothing of it from political parties vying for power in that state? The conversation instead is about “influx” aimed at polarising rather than governing. One of the frontiers of climate change in the country – the Sunderbans – is in West Bengal where the effects of global warming are already being felt in the changes in cropping patterns, emerging diseases and the frequency of cyclones.There is regular and periodic homelessness and forced migration to states like Kerala. Long term sustainability conversations are conspicuous by their absence in the poll rhetoric of the mainstream political parties. What we have instead is one party going all out to negate their harebrained plan for the rest of the country (barring the northeast) to dictate food choices, occasions when certain foods can or cannot be consumed and which meats are kosher and which are not. The other party is a willing participant in this merry tango of frivolity precisely because it helps it evade the hard questions that inevitably come after 15 years at the helm.The state government’s poster Swasthya Saathi health scheme is plagued by allegations of irregularities. There are more than 6000 single teacher schools in the state and “cut” money which refers to the percentage party cadres claim from various businesses, sometimes under the threat of violence is the harsh reality of a state where the primary concern come election time is whether voters will be allowed to exercise their franchise.The unfortunate truth of WB is that the conversation about fish and meat is a metaphor for the Hobson’s choice the state faces this election season. History is witness to the fact that no matter which symbol rules at the hustings, the foot soldiers remain almost the same set of people who have neither the depth nor the inclination to talk about anything other than frothy social media content and click bait headlines.No matter how things change, they remain the same.Full disclosure: The parentheses at the start of the title is to indicate that it has been some years now that I do not have a home in Bengal. But, it is and always will be my home state.Abantika Ghosh is a journalist and public policy professional.