Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday challenged BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari to prove that she had called up Union home minister Amit Shah over the de-recognition of the Trinamul Congress as a national party and vowed to resign as the chief minister if he did so.
Referring to the remarks made by the leader of the Opposition on Tuesday, Mamata said she was appalled by the allegation and accused the BJP of trying to malign her politically.
“I noticed reports in media outlets, with claims by (Adhikari) that after the de-recognition of Trinamul as a national party, I had supposedly called up the Union home minister four times…. One person blatantly lies… media outlets propagate the lies non-stop. After my clarification, they will put out a one-line reply. So, effectively, a false claim will get more limelight,” the chief minister told a news conference at Nabanna.
“I challenge the person who said this to prove his claims. If he can, I will resign from the post of the chief minister. If his claims are proven wrong, will the BJP leader (Adhikari) resign and accept defeat?” she asked, without taking the Nandigram MLA’s name.
Responding to her remarks, Adhikari issued a statement on Twitter, promising an expose on Thursday. “Yeh Darr Mujhe Achha Laga (I like this fear)!” he posted on the microblogging site.
“For making the call to Delhi, you used a landline. I’d expose you in due time. Wait for my befitting reply tomorrow,” added the leader of the Opposition.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) had stripped Trinamul of the status of a national party last week. Adhikari told a rally in Singur on Tuesday that Mamata had directly urged Shah to intervene.
“(On Monday), we saw how Mamata Banerjee demanded Amit Shah’s resignation. But after the commission took away Trinamul’s national party status, she repeatedly called him, requesting a repeal of the decision. It did not yield results,” Adhikari said.
The Trinamul chairperson had demanded Shah's resignation for predicting her government's implosion before "25" if the BJP got 35 Lok Sabha seats in Bengal in "24".
On Wednesday, Mamata asked whether the ECI should do the BJP’s bidding, claiming that since her party had attained national status in 2016, the panel should have waited till 2026 for a review.
“But they didn’t even wait till the 2024 general election…. Our party’s name was, is, and will remain the All India Trinamul Congress. If they (the BJP) have the ECI with them, we have the support of the people. This name wasn’t given to us out of pity, we fought hard and achieved it,” said the Trinamul chief.
The chief minister reiterated her demand for Shah’sresignation over his 35-seat remark.
“I repeat my demand for the resignation of (Shah) for misusing his constitutional post and breaking the federal structure of our country, through attempts to topplea democratically-electedgovernment,” she said,referring to Shah’s April 14 remark in Suri.
Later in the evening, Trinamul sent a letter to Adhikari, asking him to withdraw his “false and vexatious claims”, failing which, he would face legal action.
