Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee shared a stage with Abhishek Banerjee on Wednesday and unleashed an attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a day after his Calcutta road show.
Mamata also dubbed Modi’s “respect” for Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose as fake.
She said the BJP’s “lies” about Netaji were clear as the Centre led by the party did not bother to declare the patriot’s birthday a national holiday.
“Modi yesterday (Tuesday) went to Shyambazar (where he paid tribute to Netaji) to do politics. But I went there today (Wednesday) to register my protest against their lies about Netaji and offer a salute to the great leader, Mamata said at an election meeting in Calcutta’s Metiabruz in support of Trinamool’s Diamond Harbour candidate and national general secretary, Abhishek Banerjee.
“Nobody in the country knows even today where Netaji went missing,” Mamata added. “Netaji formed the Indian National Army, which made an immense contribution to our country’s independence (movement). Without Netaji, the independence of India would have been difficult. People like (Mahatma) Gandhiji, Rabindranath Tagore, B.R. Ambedkar and many others too played a great role in achieving independence. But, unfortunately even today the Centre has not recognised the contribution of Netaji by announcing his birthday as a national holiday,” she said.
The Bengal chief minister added that Modi was not an ideal person to lead the nation.
“The leader of the nation should be like Netaji.... like (Abul Kalam) Azad…. But Modi has managed to become the leader of the country. The leader of the nation should be a humane one, who believes in all religious faiths and speaks for harmony of all religious faiths. But Modi has become a leader by virtue of his money power,” Mamata said, accusing him of becoming an “arrogant” person and a “liar”.
In another election rally in Mathurapur, Mamata said Modi claimed that the Centre paid money to build dykes against erosion in the Sunderbans delta, which “was a lie”.
“I checked and found that his statement was a lie. We (the Bengal government) spent over ₹5,500 crore. He (Modi) did not pay for the 100 day’s job scheme, for housing scheme, for roads and many more (central schemes in Bengal),” Mamata said, adding that her party, the Trinamool Congress, would fight against such lies like a tiger.
Mamata repeated that despite being an INDIA partner with the CPM at the national level, Trinamool Congress would fight alone in Bengal and come to no understanding with the Left that she defeated in 2011.
“I will never compromise with the CPM, which is actually a partner of the BJP in Bengal,” Mamata said, accusing the Left of making an understanding with the BJP to try and defeat Trinamool’s candidate Saugata Roy in Dum Dum.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha poll, Trinamool veteran Roy won from Dum Dum constituency by a margin of 53,000 votes. The CPM lost 15.08 per cent votes. On the other hand, the BJP got 15.61 per cent votes, which made the party reach the second spot in the Trinamool bastion.
Earlier, speaking at the meeting, Abhishek accused the BJP of divisive politics by exploiting religion.
“This election is not just to ensure a win for Trinamool or to strengthen Mamata
Banerjee. Rather, this election is to take revenge (on the BJP) for denying people’s rights, and against the BJP’s attempts to create a division by introducing the CAA,” Abhishek, who spoke before Mamata, said.
