‘Country will be ruined if Modi comes to power’

West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday unleashed a torrent of vitriol against Narendra Modi, saying the country will be ‘ruined’ and plunge into darkness if he comes to power, a day after a furious Trinamool Congress slammed him as ‘Butcher of Gujarat’,

The no-holds barred attack against the BJP prime ministerial candidate came even as the ruling TMC demanded a public apology from him for doubting the integrity of Banerjee over the sale of her paintings and also complained to the Election Commission against him.

Rebutting the charge by her Gujarat counterpart that she had done more damage to West Bengal in 35 months of rule than the Left Front in 35 years, Banerjee also said that she did not need ‘gyan’ on development from the ‘architect of riots’.

‘If he comes to power, India will plunge into darkness. We do not need gyan (lecture) on development from the architect of riots,’ Banerjee, the Trinamool Congress supremo, said on Twitter, in signs that TMC may not forge any post-poll alliance with BJP.

‘The man who is being projected as PM candidate, if he comes to power, India will be ruined,’ she added.

On Modi’s allegation that she was indulging in vote bank politics ignoring non-Bengalis and spreading the red carpet for Bangladeshis, Banerjee told reporters that he did not know history.

Pointing out that immigrants from Bangladesh came to India under the Indira-Mujib agreement of 1971, she said, ‘Modi does not know history. He does not know that speaking in Bangla does not make one a Bangladeshi.’

She said, ‘Elsewhere in India, anyone who speaks in Bangla is branded a Bangladeshi. This is discrimination.’