Congress leader Rahul Gandhi accused Trinamool Congress (TMC) chairperson Mamata Banerjee of paving the way for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in West Bengal, where Assembly elections are underway.
Addressing an election rally in Hooghly district, Gandhi said, “Mamata ji is paving the way for the BJP in Bengal. This is the truth. If Mamata ji had worked properly, if she had worked for Bengal, had not encouraged corruption and had taken action in cases such as the rape and murder in RG Kar Hospital, there wouldn’t have been any threat from the BJP.”
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The Congress has decided to fight alone in these Assembly elections and has fielded candidates in all 294 seats. The party’s vote share dropped from 9.1% in 2011 to 3.1% in 2021. This time, however, the party is eyeing to regain its lost ground in at least four districts.
The Congress lawmaker, who is also the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, said that what Prime Minister Narendra Modi was doing at the Centre, Banerjee was doing in West Bengal.
“Neither Mamata Banerjee, nor Narendra Modi is concerned about industrialisation and unemployment. They just want power and are not interested in working for the development of the people. Modi rolled out demonetisation, wrongly imposed GST and deliberately destroyed small industries. What Modi is doing at the Centre, the same thing Mamata is doing in the state. She has destroyed industries and spread unemployment. If anyone wants employment in Bengal, he has to have a relative in the TMC,” he said.
“If Narendra Modi is encouraging corruption, Mamata is also not far behind. While Modi encourages riots across the country, Mamata resorts to violence against Congress workers in the state,” he added.
He said that the Modi government has filed several cases against him but not against TMC chairperson Mamata Banerjee, claiming this is because she does not “directly” fight the BJP.
He said that the Enforcement Directorate (ED) questioned him for 55 hours over five consecutive days. “For how many hours was Mamata Banerjee interrogated?” he added.
He added that there is no probe by the ED or the CBI against the West Bengal chief minister.
National spokesperson of the TMC, Shashi Panja, said, “Rahul Gandhi’s comments are irresponsible. AITC leaders are being served ED and CBI summons even during elections, while he is busy playing with his dog and feeding biscuits. Let the people of Bengal and later India decide who is truly capable of defeating the BJP. If the Congress had fought sincerely, then BJP, which faced a setback in Lok Sabha elections, wouldn’t have won states like Maharashtra, Haryana, Delhi and Bihar.”
BJP leader Rahul Sinha also hit back. “Rahul Gandhi says one thing and does another. He is raising allegations against the TMC while he is in West Bengal. When he returns to Delhi, he will meet with TMC leaders and seek their help in the Lok Sabha. The TMC has almost decimated the Congress in West Bengal and that’s why he is attacking the TMC,” he said.
