West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee led an anti-NRC rally today in North Kolkata. (Express photo)Leading a protest march in Kolkata over the exclusion of over 19 lakh people from the Assam NRC list, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee cautioned BJP to not play with fire in the name of NRC and said she would not allow the exercise to be implemented in Bengal.
“Those trying to divide people in the name of NRC are playing with fire. If BJP touches even one person in Bengal in the name of NRC, we will teach them a lesson,” PTI quoted Banerjee as saying.
The Trinamool Congress supremo was leading an anti-NRC protest march from Sinthee to Shyambazar in north Kolkata.
Challenging BJP leaders to implement NRC in Bengal, Banerjee said, “We will never allow NRC in Bengal. We will not allow them to divide the people on religious and caste lines.” The CM further said the BJP government was silencing the people of Assam by using police force but would not be able to silence Bengal.
Last week, the ruling party Trinamool Congress and Opposition parties, Left Front and Congress, together passed a resolution in the Assembly against the National Register of Citizens (NRC).
“The implementation of the NRC is nothing but a political vendetta of the BJP-led central government. We will never let BJP implement the National Register of Citizens in West Bengal,” Banerjee had said at the Assembly.
Criticising Banerjee’s rally, BJP West Bengal President Dilip Ghosh claimed that the TMC government in the state was protecting more than one crore Rohingyas and Bangladeshi Muslims. Accepting her challenge, he said, Banerjee would “soon get to see how the BJP implements NRC in Bengal” and throw out Bangladeshi infiltrators, who have now become a trusted vote bank of the Trinamool Congress (TMC).
-with PTI inputs
