The ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) in West Bengal held state-wide protests on Monday accusing Union home minister Amit Shah of making derogatory remarks against BR Ambedkar in Parliament.
Party leaders, including ministers and legislators, held protest rallies in various municipal wards of Kolkata. Rallies were also organised in various blocks and districts across the state between 2 pm and 3 pm.
“See their audacity. They are attacking BR Ambedkar, standing in Parliament. This is such a big crime. This is unpardonable. Protests are going on in various municipal wards, blocks, villages and districts,” Shashi Panja, state woman and child development minister, told the media while leading a protest march at Girish Park in north Kolkata.
Last week, during a debate in the Rajya Sabha, Shah said that the Congress had made it a fashion to take Ambedkar’s name repeatedly.
“If they had taken the name of God so many times instead of Ambedkar, they would have got heaven for seven lives,” Shah said, triggering a massive row.
Claiming that the remark was an insult to BR Ambedkar, the INDIA bloc partners have demanded Shah’s resignation or removal.
TMC supremo and West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee expressed her shock over Shah’s remarks and called for a state-wide protest on December 23.
{{/usCountry}}TMC supremo and West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee expressed her shock over Shah’s remarks and called for a state-wide protest on December 23.
{{/usCountry}}“To condemn this, we will organise protest rallies across all blocks of Bengal and every civic ward of Kolkata on December 23 from 2 pm to 3 pm,” Banerjee wrote on Facebook on December 20.
“TMC has organised protests on the directions of Mamata Banerjee. Shah’s statement has unmasked the BJP. They have insulted the Constitution and Ambedkar who chaired its drafting committee. Shah should either resign or apologise,” Kunal Ghosh, TMC leader, told media persons while leading a rally in Kolkata.
“We were shocked to hear that. How can a Union minister make such comments in Parliament? He took oath as an MP and a minister, holding the Constitution. Now he is insulting that Constitution,” said Chandrima Bhattacharya, state urban development minister.
State BJP leaders hit back at the TMC. “The TMC should hold a protest rally for insulting the people of West Bengal. Look what they have turned West Bengal into? This land of Rabindranath Tagore and Swami Vivekananda is now under TMC leaders such as Anubrata Mondal and Arabul Islam,” Shankar Ghosh, BJP legislator, told media persons.