Chopra: Trinamool Congress supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee Wednesday said the upcoming Lok Sabha elections will drive BJP out of power and ensure that Narendra Modi will never again be the prime minister. The Trinamool Congress will help form the next government at the Centre, she claimed and urged the people to vote for it. Banerjee said TMC will not allow NRC in Bengal or amend the Citizenship Bill.
“This time it is a very important election. This election is to defeat the BJP. It is to drive out the BJP from power … This election is to make sure that Narendra Modi can never be the prime minister of the country again. We must ensure that they (BJP) never come back,” Banerjee said at an election rally at Chopra in Uttar Dinajpur district. “The TMC will form the next government. We will drive out the BJP from the country,” she said urging people to vote for Trinamool Congress.
Taking a jibe at Modi, Banerjee said that for the past four-and-half years the prime minister was busy touring foreign countries. “Suddenly he has become so conscious about the welfare of his countrymen”. “Five years ago he was the chaiwala and now he is suddenly the chowkidar. And after the elections people will not find him anywhere. For four and half years he was busy touring the globe and now there is no employment here, farmers have died failing to pay their debts … He was mum when people were lynched. I call him (Modi) dangabaaz (rioteer) and a lutera (looter),” she said.
Banerjee said that TMC will not allow BJP to implement NRC in West Bengal. “If anyone tries to touch anybody in West Bengal, we will not spare BJP. They (BJP) are conspiring to drive away everybody from the country in the name of amending the Citizenship Bill … We will not let them amend the Bill,” she said. Urging the electorate not to cast their votes for the Congress, the TMC chief further alleged that RSS was helping that party’s candidates in West Bengal.
Not naming anyone, she alleged that the Congress candidate (Adhir Chowdhury) fighting from Baharampore and former president Pranab Mukherjee’s son contesting from Jangipur seat (Abhijit Mukherjee) are being supported by the RSS. “Here Congress is an ally of the BJP … The RSS earlier used to practice parade wearing half pants but now after the demonetisation it has become so big,” she said. “If you vote for the Congress vote or for CPI-M, it will eventually give strength to BJP,” she added.
Banerjee said no one from BJP, the Congress nor CPI-M had visited Darjeeling in the past five years but she had made it a point to visit the Hills almost every month. “Where were these leaders in the last five years ? You have not seen them (the BJP, Congress and the CPI-M). They all are one here in West Bengal. Do not vote for them,” she said. The Darjeeling Lok Sabha constituency is set to witness a keenly-fought contest between the two warring factions of the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM) — one led by its supremo Bimal Gurung and another by his one time protege Binay Tamang. The TMC is yet to win the Darjeeling seat even once since its inception in 1998, while the BJP has emerged victorious twice.