Abhishek sets target for TMC to win all Panchayat seats in Birbhum

Kolkata: Trinamool Congress (TMC) national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee on Thursday called for a more transparent and vibrant three-tier Panchayat system.

He was addressing a rally as part of the Trinamool-e Nabajowar (new wave in Trinamool) mass outreach campaign at Labhpur in Birbhum.

He once again urged people to cast their votes through secret ballots to select candidates for Panchayat elections. He said it will be a people’s Panchayat. Banerjee has already stated that the Trinamool Congress presently controls all the Zilla Parishad and most of the Gram Panchayats in the state.

“They (BJP) had started the campaign for Lok Sabha elections with much fanfare in Birbhum. But what happened? They lost both Lok Sabha seats in Birbhum. We scored 10 out of 11 goals (winning 10 out of the 11 Assembly seats) in 2021. We lost one then, but in the coming elections, we have to ensure we win all Panchayats in Birbhum in all the 11 seats,” Banerjee said.

He added that the victory in Birbhum will not only be a reply to the “step-motherly approach” and “vendetta politics” meted out by the BJP towards Bengal but also send a message that no amount of intimidation by the CBI-ED can “stop the fight for people’s rights”.

Training guns at the BJP-led Centre Banerjee said: “We have to show these outsiders yet again what the people of Bengal are capable of. We had shown it to them once in 2021. They can do whatever they want and with whomever they want but they have to release the funds that belong to our people. No ED-CBI intimidation will stop our fight for the people.”

Banerjee also said that the Bengal government extended Lakshmir Bhandar to 2 crore people. He once again reiterated how the people of Bengal have benefitted from a host of schemes.

“After BJP lost the 2021 Assembly elections in Bengal, they have deliberately extended a step-motherly attitude towards Bengal and have been depriving us of our rightful dues. BJP had started the campaign for Lok Sabha elections with much fanfare in Birbhum. But what happened? We scored 10 out of 11 (seats). In the coming elections, the score will be 11-0 in favour of Trinamool,” he said.

Meanwhile, Trinamool-e Nabajowar completed 2,000 km and over 1,000 Gram Panchayats have been covered by Banerjee so far. He started the ‘Trinamool-e Nabojowar’ campaign on April 25 from Dinhata in Cooch Behar to strengthen democracy in Bengal and to include the participatory form of governance in the Panchayats.

In the past 17 days of the campaign, AITC’s ‘Jana Sanjog Yatra’ has already covered over 2,000 km across eight districts — from Cooch Behar to Birbhum.