The Bengal Pradesh Congress on Friday got its councillors to withdraw support from the Trinamool Congress-run Kharagpur municipal board, reducing its UPA ally to a minority on the board.
Situated on the junction of East and West Midnapore districts - both of which are on the political radar of the Trinamool and the Congress for expansion, Kharagpur enjoys strategic importance for political parties. While East Midnapore is a Trinamool stronghold, the West is a Maoist belt.
Friday’s development came in tandem with a letter being dashed off by PCC president Pradip Bhattacharya to Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee asking her to reign in her “Vairab Vahini” (the Trinamool equivalent of CPI(M)’s Harmads or mercenaries) who have allegedly been attacking Congress workers through out the State.
“The Chief Minister has been requested to reign in Trinamool goons who are attacking our men and immediately start a State-wide operation to recover illegal arms which have piled up in the hands of the Trinamool workers,” a PCC leader said quoting Bhattacharya.
Incidentally the letter was issued within days of the Chief Minister setting terms for truce between the two parties by asking the Congress to conduct itself in a manner that did not give mileage to the CPI(M) in the State.
Four Congress workers were shot at by alleged Trinamool men at Canning in South 24 Parganas a couple of days ago.
Bhattacharya refused to comment on the development at Kharagpur but said the PCC would not object to “such decisions being taken at the local level” leading the Trinamool leadership to warn the Congress against “playing dirty politics to the benefit of the CPI(M).”
The Trinamool has 15 seats while the Congress has 14 in the 35-seat Kharagpur municipality. Support was withdrawn on account of malfunctioning of the Board and complaints of rampant corruption, a PCC member said but refused to comment when asked whether the Congress would stake a claim to form the Board with outside support from the Left.
Meanwhile, Trinamool leader and Bengal Minister Firhad Hakim said there were certain parties who are surviving on the Trinamool largesse but “trying to backstab us” adding that “they should remember that there is a limit to our patience.”
About the letter sent to the Chief Minister, the Trinamool leader said the it was the Congress that had “teamed up with the CPI(M) to eliminate TMC workers and not the other way round.”
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