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In back-to-back rallies, Shah, Mamata trade barbs with 3 days left for polls
Addressing voters at back-to-back rallies in different parts of south Bengal, Shah and Banerjee raised political temperature in the poll-bound state.
Union home minster Amit Shah on Tuesday accused West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee of creating a scam out of her social welfare schemes while the latter accused the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of bribing people to win the eight-phase election that begins on March 27.
Addressing voters at back-to-back rallies in different parts of south Bengal, Shah and Banerjee raised political temperature in the poll-bound state.
“The BJP is spending lakhs of rupees. They will offer ₹100, ₹500, ₹5000 to people and ask them to vote for the BJP. Do not forget this is people’s money. The money does not belong to the BJP,” Banerjee said at Kashipur in Purulia district.
“Narendra Modi has started 115 schemes for your development. Mamata Banerjee has started 115 scams to rob you,” Shah said at a rally in South 24 Parganas district’s Gosaba which is located in the Sunderbans area. He reiterated that as promised in the election manifesto, the BJP will enforce the new citizenship law in Bengal if it comes to power.
“Mamata Banerjee wants to make bhatija (nephew) the next chief minister while Narendra Modi wants your welfare,” said Shah without naming Abhishek Banerjee, the chief minister’s nephew and president of the youth front of the Trinamool Congress (TMC). He also held several rallies.
Banerjee, who addressed three rallies in Purulia district, attacked the BJP by calling it a “party of ruffians and demons” and asked party workers to guard the buildings where electronic voting machines (EVMs) will be kept after polling.
“If someone offers you biryani while guarding these places don’t have it. There can be sleeping pills, drugs or poison in the food to make you fall asleep. If policemen from other states ask you to leave, tell them that you are guarding the EVMs just like they are doing their duty,” Banerjee said at Para in Purulia.
At Raghunathpur, Banerjee alleged that the Centre is selling off public sector companies and the only one still running is Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “factory of lies”.
Criticising the promises the BJP has made in its election manifesto Banerjee said people of Assam and Tripura are witnessing how those states are being governed. “Millions of people are jobless there,” she said.
Banerjee also alleged that police forces are being sent to Bengal from Uttar Pradesh. “Is this being done to capture polling booths,” said Banerjee. She accused the BJP of shipping in troublemakers from Jharkhand. “Keep your eyes open. Drive them out,” she said.
TMC’s leader in the Rajya Sabha, Derek O’Brien, lodged a complaint with the Election Commission of India on Monday, saying a few hundred people have been brought to the Nandigram constituency in East Midnapore district by BJP candidate Suvendu Adhikari against whom Banerjee is contesting. O’Brien’s letter mentioned four specific addresses. He claimed these people have been kept at these addresses.
The Criminal investigation Department (CID) of the West Bengal police started a probe into the bomb blast that killed a child in East Burdwan district on Monday. It is alleged that the bomb was abandoned by criminals and some children found it. The police registered a suo motu case at Rasikpur police station. No arrest was made till Tuesday night.
