“If there can be a change (in power) in Egypt, if there can be changes in government (over the past few years) in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, why cannot there be change in West Bengal – the only State where it has not happened?” asked Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee at an election rally in Islampur in Uttar Dinajpur district of the State on Thursday.
Appealing to the people in an area which has a large minority population “not to be divided on communal lines” and to “give a fitting reply to the Communist Party of India (Marxist), the Bharatiya Janata Party and Independent candidates” by voting for her party in the coming Assembly elections, she said that “history is about to be written” in the State.
While the Independent candidates she spoke of were those among dissident Congress leaders who have chosen to contest seats which the Trinamool Congress had chosen for itself in a district where the Congress is considered the larger party in the alliance, she described the CPI (M) and BJP as “brothers” in the State.
“The BJP and the CPI (M) are working together in West Bengal. The BJP is there to divide anti-Left votes….The Independents also are dalals (agents) of the CPI (M),” charged Ms. Banerjee, speaking on the fifth day of her electoral campaign in north Bengal.
Promising that if the Trinamool Congress-Congress alliance is voted to power the new government “will adopt the recommendations of the Sachar Committee”, she attacked the Left Front government for failing to bring about development in the region.
Accusing it of being responsible for “no industry, no good hospital, no medical colleges” in the area, she said that people were “not even getting the 100 days of work” they were entitled to under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme.
“The CPI (M) has only one job – wait for floods and then divert funds received as assistance from the Centre,” she said.
‘Debt burden'
“People here are not provided jobs; they have to go to other States for one…This Left Front government will be leaving behind a massive debt burden…All development work has stopped…This is the way the CPI (M) has been ruling the State for the past 35 years. It will not be able to any longer,” Ms. Banerjee asserted.
