Firhad Hakim campaigns for Mamata, urges voters to choose peace & harmony

Kolkata: Firhad Hakim, the state Transport minister, urged people to throng the polling stations and cast their vote in favour of Mamata Banerjee, the Trinamool candidate for the by-election in Bhabanipur Assembly seat to preserve communal peace and harmony and uninterrupted development in Bengal.

The by-election will be held on September 30. There are about 2.31 lakh voters in Bhabanipur. Besides Banerjee, BJP has fielded Priyanka Tibrewal and CPI(M)'s nominee is Srijib Biswas.

Hakim said: "BJP is an empty vessel that sounds too much. BJP leaders make false promises and are more interested to divide society on the basis of religion and caste. In 2021 Assembly elections, the party tried hard to divide Bengal on the basis of religion but the people came up with a befitting reply," he said while addressing an election meeting on Friday evening in Khidderpore's ward 77.

He urged people to vote for Banerjee to take revenge for the Nandigram conspiracy. "Mamata Banerjee was defeated following a conspiracy and some traitors had backstabbed her. We should take revenge of her defeat," he maintained.

Coming down heavily on the state BJP leadership, he said: "State leaders like Dilip Ghosh, Shamik Bhattacharya or Rahul Sinha did not have the guts to face Mamata Banerjee and hence, a young candidate has been nominated who was defeated by TMC in the Assembly election by over 58,000 votes."

He said under Narendra Modi's rule, people's suffering has gone up due to the hike in the prices of cooking gas, petrol and diesel and essential commodities. "Think before you cast your vote. On one side is Mamata Banerjee with her development schemes and on the other is communal BJP whose only motive is to spread lies and divide society."