In an apparent indication that the Citizenship Amendment Act had hit Mamata Banerjee hard in Bengal’s electoral battleground the Trinamool Congress on Sunday launched a scathing attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi for playing a “divisive” politics by introducing a “useless and purely discriminatory law aimed at dividing people to win votes.”
Senior Bengal Minister Firhad Hakim who took up the cudgel in the absence of an ailing Chief Minister, told in an election meeting at Malda how “the Prime Minister is dividing the people by bringing discriminatory, religion-based laws like the CAA and doing politics on Ram temple … all to befool the voters and take attention from the real issues like unemployment and price rise.”
Modi should have remembered that he was not the Prime Minister of any particular sect, or creed or people but he was the Prime Minister of the entire country, Hakim said contrasting him with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
“While the PM has given you CAA aimed at appeasing a section of the voters, while he has given you ED and CBI which are extorting machines Mamata Banerjee has given you Laxmir Bhandar where the women get Rs 1,000 every month, Kanyashree, Rupashree, for women’s betterment and Student’s credit card for ensuring better education and Swasthya Saathi for ensuring good health to all and not a selective section of people … this is called good governance and acchhe din and not what Modi has given you --- which is nothing but politics of hatred,” the Bengal ministers said.
When the Prime Minister came to power in 2014, he had promised “Acchhe din” (good days), Hakim, said reminding how “he promised 2 crore jobs per year , he promised Rs 15 lakhs in every person’s account, he promised to fight inflation and corruption … but nothing of that sort happened … instead inflation and unemployment have has gone up … and now he is talking the Prime Minister about guarantees without fulfilling his earlier promises,” but “failed to keep a single of these promises.” Quoting TMC general Secretary Abhishek Banerjee’s that “Modi’s guarantee has no warrantee,” the minister said, “Mamata Banerjee on the other hand has fulfilled all the promises she kept,” adding the people of Bengal would bless the Chief Minister this year also.
In 2021 Assembly elections “the national leaders of BJP came and went everyday and gave an impression that they had almost taken away Bengal … they made it look like so in the media … but at the end of the day could not even reach three-figure mark … this year also they face a humiliating defeat as the people are firmly behind Mamata Banerjee,” he said. Attacking the Election Commission of India for acting in a manner that suited the BJP another minister Chandrima Bhattacharya questioned the need of a 7-phase election in Bengal. “When elections can take place in one or two phases in Gujarat and other places … then why not in Bengal … in fact lesser number of phases can ensure bigger participation of the people … but BJP wants lesser number of people to come out,” she said.
Wondering why the ECI was sending more than 92,000 central forces to Bengal, Bhattacharya said that the election panel was trying to show that the law and order was not in good shape in the State but actually they want these forces to help the BJP men. “We have instances to show how the CAPF jawans had threatened the voters to vote in favour of the BJP earlier,” she said asking the Trinamool workers to remain cautious.
