Abhishek Banerjee stressed the need for women’s empowerment, lauding the Trinamul Congress-led government’s role in it, while Mamata Banerjee underscored how earnest her regime is in minimising heinous crimes against women, in the pieces they wrote for party mouthpiece Jago Bangla’s sharodiya edition.
Both pieces were penned amid the fallout of the RG Kar tragedy.
“We should remember that our city, Calcutta, has been considered safe according to the Centre’s data....Today, a party like the BJP should keep quiet on the safety of women because in their regime the worst possible incidents of Manipur took place that are more appalling than even medieval barbarism,” wrote Abhishek, the Trinamool’s national general secretary, in his piece titled “Bangla shorboda nari khomotayoneyr dhatribhumi (Bengal has always been the birthplace of women empowerment)”.
The autumnal Durga Puja special edition of Jago Bangla — Trinamul’s Bengali mouthpiece published twice daily — was unveiled by chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday at an event the Diamond Harbour MP could not attend, as he is away to get ocular treatment.
Tearing into the BJP camp — presumably over its acerbic criticism of the Trinamul dispensation over the RG Kar tragedy and the safety of women in the state — Abhishek brought up infamous instances of crimes against women in places under the BJP’s command, such as Hathras, Unnao and Kathua.
“Ours is but one demand, stern legislation against rape. In order to realise that, the Ma-Mati-Manush government has already brought a very important bill. We hope the bill would be enacted soon,” wrote Abhishek, towards the end of an elaborate historical essay on Bengal’s role over more than two centuries in the empowerment of women since the South Asian Renaissance that began in Calcutta.
In her piece — titled “Kyano ei ainta korlam? Kyano? Kyano? Kyano? (Why we made this legislation? Why? Why? Why?)” — Mamata brought up the rape and murder of the junior doctor at RG Kar and wrote the incident has “completely ravaged (her) heart in a fire”.
“We will keep Bengal’s Aparajitas aparajita (undefeated),” Mamata wrote.