The saffron camp has accused leaders of Mamata Banerjee’s party of creating hurdles in their way of helping people during the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic in Jalpaiguri and has simultaneously alleged that the district administration is biased.

“Trinamul leaders, workers and supporters with no official position are roaming around freely in the streets every day, despite restrictions, on the pretext of reaching out to people during the pandemic. On the other hand, whenever our leaders and workers take initiatives to help people, they are stopped, either by Trinamul cadres or by the administration,” said Bapi Goswami, the Jalpaiguri district BJP president.

He also alleged that while the Trinamul supporters were allowed to go scot-free, those in BJP are threatened with legal steps for allegedly flouting the curbs.

“We had witnessed a similar attitude of the police and administration during last year’s lockdown....This is complete bias,” added Goswami.

Trinamul leaders, on the other hand, have accused the BJP of needlessly creating controversies.

K.K. Kalyani, the district Trinamul president, said they have been consistently working for people during and have engaged their frontal organisations in the task.

“We have formed teams in wards to help to Covid patients and their families….. recently, we even engaged our teachers’ front. They are going to households, distributing free ration and providing other help,” said Kalyani. “The cadres of the BJP have not taken any initiative to stand by people and are only interested in political activities. To hide their failure, they are saying these things. In Jalpaiguri, many organisations are into relief and other work, and no one is stopping them,” Kalyani added.

Trinamul leaders also asked what the BJP did for people directly or indirectly affected by the pandemic.

In Jalpaiguri, the BJP won four of seven seats. The remaining three seats were bagged by Trinamul.

“Only one-and-a-half-months back, thousands voted for BJP and those candidates are MLAs now. What are they doing these days? Like the MPs who had got elected back in 2019 and did nothing for north Bengal, the MLAs and their party leaders have miserably failed to stand by the people,” said a senior Trinamul leader.

Siliguri Municipal Corporation (SMC), run by a board of administrators with former state minister Gautam Deb as chairman, will provide free oxygen supply to patients who need it from Monday.

The civic body, sources said, has also opened an emergency relief fund to treat Covid patients.

“To start with, the chairperson (Deb) has donated Rs 1.54 lakh in the fund out of his own resources,” said the source.