Rahul Gandhi on Thursday promised a united fight by the INDIA bloc against the BJP, speaking minutes after his Nyay Yatra entered Bengal, but then abruptly left for Delhi triggering speculation that the Congress was desperate to placate Mamata Banerjee.

The Bengal chief minister had on Wednesday indicated disapproval of the Yatra entering her state, and posters asking Rahul to go elsewhere had cropped up along its route on Thursday.

“The INDIA bloc will together fight the injustice in the country unleashed by the RSS and the BJP. They are spreading hatred and violence across the country and the INDIA formation will defeat them,” Rahul said in a brief speech at Boxirhat, near the Assam border, after entering Bengal at 10.45am.

His comment about a united fight came within 24 hours of Mamata publicly declaring that Trinamul would go it alone in Bengal and complaining that the Congress had not informed her about the Yatra’s plan to enter Bengal.

That her remarks had left the Congress jittery became evident when party communications chief Jairam Ramesh issued a statement on Wednesday, within a couple of hours of Mamata’s outburst, underscoring her importance to the Opposition bloc.

Rahul, who had launched the Yatra on January 14 from Manipur, arrived in Bengal after covering the northeastern states of Nagaland, Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh and Assam.

In his two-minute speech at Boxirhat, Rahul spoke about the hostility he and his team had faced in BJP-ruled Assam. But he spoke not a word on how Trinamul was trying to disparage the Yatra in Bengal.

After Mamata’s comments of Wednesday, Trinamul leaders such as Udayan Guha, the north Bengal development minister, had questioned the need for the Yatra entering Bengal.

As Rahul travelled from the Assam border to Cooch Behar town on Thursday, scores of people were spotted along the route carrying posters with messages such as “Bengal doesn’t need anyone other than Didi” and “Rahul should visit other states”.

The loudest among the posters was one that accused state Congress president Adhir Chowdhury of creating opportunities for the BJP in Bengal.

Unlike the previous legs of the Yatra — during which Rahul had got off the bus and walked short distances to interact with the people — his convoy raced through a 45km stretch, with the former Congress president occasionally waving at people from the bus. The Yatra reached Khagrabari, the entry point to Cooch Behar town, around 12.15pm.

Instead of addressing the people gathered at Khagrabari, Rahul got off the bus, climbed into another vehicle and headed for the Hasimara air force station from where he flew to Delhi.

“The party had already decided on a two-day break for the Yatra. As it resumes on January 28, he will arrive here and join it again,” a Congress leader said.

“There was a delay in the schedule and, therefore, some changes were made to the programme. Rahul was anyway supposed to leave for Delhi from Falakata on Friday — instead, he went today. But he will be back here for the rest of the Yatra.”

Falakata, where the Yatra will halt for two days, is 85km from Boxirhat.

Despite the efforts of Rahul’s spin doctors, his actions and words during the brief Bengal stint of the Yatra so far has led political observers to wonder whether he had tweaked his plans to placate Mamata after her comments on Wednesday.

“The Congress’s desperation to please Mamata has been showing since Jairam Ramesh’s comments yesterday (Wednesday).... Rahul took it to another level by practically doing nothing in Bengal,” an observer said.

He referred to how Adhir, a known Mamata baiter who was on the dais at Boxirhat for around two hours before Rahul arrived, was not allowed to make any speeches from the stage.

That the Congress was being extra careful in choosing its words became apparent when a state unit leader, while addressing the gathering before Rahul’s arrival, added an immediate correction to his initial pledge of fighting “the ruler” by clarifying he had meant the BJP.

While the Congress leadership maintained a low profile to please Mamata, Trinamul’s north Bengal leaders did not hide their glee and claimed that Rahul had left because he had realised that the Congress lacked support in Bengal.

Adhir attacked

Trinamul on Thursday blamed Adhir, who was uncharacteristically quiet on Thursday, for the unravelling of the INDIA combine in Bengal, pointing to his unrelenting attacks on Mamata.

The Trinamul leader in the Rajya Sabha, Derek O’Brien, told reporters in Delhi on Thursday: “The three reasons for the INDIA alliance not working in West Bengal are, one, Adhir, two, Adhir, and three, Adhir…. Adhir is a gravedigger of the Congress….”

Asked whether this was the end of the road for the attempt to have a seat-sharing arrangement with the Congress in Bengal, or whether there was a window for reconciliation, O’Brien said “we turned the page” on Wednesday.

He refused to be drawn into commenting on whether Trinamul was quitting the INDIA bloc.

“After the general election, if the Congress does its job and defeats the BJP on a substantial number of seats, the Trinamul Congress will very much be a part of the front that believes and fights for the Constitution,” he said.

The INDIA bloc, O’Brien said, has two main detractors — the BJP and Adhir.

“For the last two years, he (Adhir) has been speaking the BJP’s language,” O’Brien said, adding that the party had flagged this before the Congress leadership many times but no action had been taken.

He said that despite Adhir’s repeated attacks on Mamata, “not one TMC MP, minister or MLA said anything against the Congress party or its senior leadership”.

This, along with the repeated extensions of the deadline for a seat-sharing arrangement, demonstrated the “patience and graciousness” of Trinamul, O’Brien said.

Adhir was quoted as saying at a meeting in Siliguri on Thursday: “I am being maligned, targeted, attacked for my anti-Trinamul stand. That is to be expected. It is tolerable. But, on account of that, the level of discourtesy being accorded to Rahul Gandhi here is unacceptable. I find it very sad, personally.”