Mamata challenges BJP to win 200 seats in LS polls
Kolkata: During her election campaign rally at Krishnanagar, Trinamool Congress (TMC) chairperson Mamata Banerjee mocked the BJP’s target of 400-plus seats in the Lok Sabha polls and challenged them to win at least 200 Parliamentary constituencies in the country.
“The BJP is saying ‘400 paar’ (400+), I challenge them to cross the 200 seats benchmark first. In the 2021 Assembly polls, they gave a call of 200 plus seats but had to stop at 77,” she said addressing a rally at Dhubulia in Nadia in support of her party candidate from Krishnanagar, Mahua Moitra.
Discouraging people against voting for the opposition parties in Bengal, she said: “I started INDIA. I gave the name. After the elections, I will see. But in Bengal, a vote to the CPM or the Congress means a vote to the BJP. There is no alliance here in Bengal. It is only a conspiracy. We will fight the BJP alone in Bengal and defeat them.”
The Congress and the CPM are yet to finalise the seat-sharing arrangement and there are problems with other Left parties, especially the Forward Bloc. Even the 2021 Assembly poll alliance partner, Indian Secular Front, is not on the same page with the CPM.
She assured that voting for TMC will ensure that the people in the state continue to get the benefits of the various social welfare schemes of Bengal such as Kanyashree, Swasthya Sathi, Lakshmir Bhandar etc.
Accusing the BJP of “weaponising” Central probe agencies, Banerjee said that CBI (Central Bureau of Investigation) ED (Enforcement Directorate), NIA (National Investigation Agency), IT (Income Tax) are being unleashed against her party workers and leaders.
“I was talking to one of our party men. For three days, 16 officers from the Income Tax department were at his home, his family was not allowed to use the toilet or cook. If BJP is so confident of winning the Lok Sabha polls, why are you using agencies, why are the state officers being transferred?” she questioned.
She referred to the recent closure of CBI cases against NCP president Praful Patel after he defected to BJP. “The BJP washing machine has cleaned the stains,” she said. Banerjee told her party workers: “They will send notices and summons. In your reply, say you are busy with the elections and will respond after the poll process is over.”
TMC’s Krishnanagar candidate Mahua Moitra, who was expelled from Parliament last December in connection with a cash-for-query charge, saw a CBI raid at her home and office recently and was also summoned for interrogation in Delhi by the ED which she ignored.
Banerjee, speaking in favour of Moitra, hit out at the BJP candidate ‘Rajmata’ Amrita Roy who belongs to the Krishnanagar royal family. Mamata said: “Who is Rajmata? Who is the King? We are all kings in this king’s kingdom (amra sabai raja amader ei rajar rajatye). Now everybody is a subject and no one is the king. If somebody claims to be king, he should better stay in the palace.”
