Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Saturday accused West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee of running West Bengal “according to her whims and fancies”.
Addressing his first election rally in the State, Mr. Gandhi launched a two-pronged attack, on the Bharatiya Janata Party government at the Centre and the Trinamool Congress government in West Bengal. “Bengal is being run by just one person. She neither talks to anyone nor takes anybody's suggestion. She does whatever she feels like,” Congress president said addressing a rally at Chanchal in Malda district.
Mr. Gandhi went on to ask the gathering whether it was not important for Bengal to have its own voice. “Tell me what has Mamataji done for you. Nothing has been done for the farmers and youth. There is unemployment everywhere. Only Mamataji’s speeches go on all day long,” he said.
Mr. Gandhi put the 34-year-old rule of the Communist Party of India (Marxist)-led Left Front and the present regime of the Trinamool Congress in the same bracket.
“You have seen the CPI(M) rule for years …The atrocities that used to happen during the CPI(M ) rule are still happening under Mamataji. Earlier there was a government of one organisation and now there is government of one person,” he said.
The Congress president also came down heavily on Mausam Benazir Noor, the MP from Malda North who joined the Trinamool Congress a few months ago. Though he did not name her, Mr. Gandhi asked the people not to forget that she had “deceived” them. “This is a Congress bastion, and you must make her realise that by deceiving the people, one cannot work in Bengal,” he said.
The Trinamool Congress leadership was quick to respond to Mr. Gandhi's attacks and said the Congress president was wasting his time in Bengal. “He should concentrate his energies on other states. Here the Trinamool Congress is well placed to stop any rise of the BJP,” TMC leader and Kolkata Mayor Firhad Hakim said.
Modi chowkidar of the corrupt
Training his guns on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Mr. Gandhi dubbed him as the “chowkidar of the corrupt” such as Nirav Modi, Mehul Choksi and Vijay Mallya. He also raked up the Rafale issue and said Mr. Modi had gifted Anil Ambani ₹30,000 crore of public money. Mr. Gandhi said that upcoming Lok Sabha elections would be a fight between ideologies.
“On one hand you have the Congress party which is fighting to keep the country united, and on the other the BJP-RSS-Narendra Modi combine which wants to divide the country on religious and caste lines,” he said.
