The Trinamool Congress, which has entered into an alliance with the Congress to fight the Left Front in the Lok Sabha election in West Bengal, on Wednesday strongly disapproved of the Congress overtures to the Left as the poll entered the final phase.
“We are opposed to any alliance at
the Centre which includes the CPI(M),” Trinamool Congress leader Partho Chatterjee said in Kolkata.
Reacting to AICC General Secretary Rahul Gandhi’s statement yesterday that he expected the Left to support a government to be led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Chatterjee, a close aide of party chief Mamata Banerjee, said, “This is a very untimely comment made by the Congress leader when we are fighting the battle jointly against the CPI(M) in the last lap of elections in West Bengal.”
“The assessment by the Congress leader (Rahul Gandhi) about the Left will break the morale and jeopardise the strength of the Congress-Trinamool alliance in the state,” Chatterjee, who is the leader of Opposition in the state Assembly, said.
Gandhi had on Tuesday said in New Delhi that the Congress looked forward to working with the Left parties in the post-poll scenario while expressing confidence that the communists would accept Manmohan Singh as Prime Minister in a Congress-led disposition.