West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday hit out at the BJP over the latter’s plan to hold rath yatras across the state. (File)In a veiled attack on the BJP, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday said rath yatras are not carried out to ‘kill people’. While addressing an event in 24 Parganas, the minister referred to religious organisations such as the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) that hold Jagannath rath yatra and said, “ISKCON conducts Rath Yatras, they carry out the Jagannath Rath Yatra; they don’t carry out yatras to kill people.”
“Those who carry out yatras to kill people indulge in danga yatras. There are yatras for Lord Krishna and Lord Jagannath and we take part in such rath yatras,” the Trinamool Congress (TMC) supremo was quoted as saying by news agency ANI.
The TMC leader’s remarks comes days after the saffron party moved the Supreme Court and sought an urgent hearing against a Calcutta High Court order denying clearance for its proposed rath yatras across the state. The apex court registry, however, declined the urgent hearing and is likely to hear the matter when the court reopens on January 2.
The yatra was scheduled to be flagged off by party chief Amit Shah.
Earlier, the party had approached the Calcutta High Court after the TMC government had refused to grant permission for its three yatras. On December 20, the single bench of the high court had allowed the BJP to go ahead with the programme, but a division bench of the high court later stayed the order.
Challenging this before the apex court, the BJP, in its plea, said the Trinamool Congress “is trying to snatch voting rights of the people by threatening them and demolishing the democratic rights of the people, which could be seen by the fact that 34 % of seats in panchayat elections went uncontested”.
The party submitted that it “has decided to protest against the lawlessness…very much prevalent in the state of West Bengal” and added that “to organise the rally is a way to make people aware of their rights, their options and to save democracy”.
The plea said that the rise of the BJP and dissatisfaction among the people with the state government can be seen from panchayat elections conducted earlier this year. “West Bengal has seen unprecedented violence and deaths in the last few years, and the general public, members of BJP, (and) members of other political parties are being killed for showing dissent…It is (a) fact that the state of West Bengal is in absolute lawless situation and there are such anarchy and arbitrary actions every day”, the party has claimed.
