Accusing Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee of being soft on infiltration from Bangladesh, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Amit Shah said here on Sunday that during the All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) regime in Bengal cross-border infiltration from Bangladesh has increased five times.
“I have come here to say ‘Didi (Ms. Banerjee ) do not think about Bangladeshi infiltrators so much, think about the people of Bengal,” Mr Shah said, addressing a rally in the city.
Accusing Ms. Banerjee of indulging in “appeasement politics,” he urged her to stop “infiltration” and focus on “good governance.”
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Mr. Shah told the gathering if they want Ms. Banerjee to be answerable to them, they have to start by voting for the BJP in the Chowringhee by-polls and in the 2016 Assembly elections. The BJP president said that the party securing 17 per cent votes in the recently concluded Lok Sabha polls in Bengal was not a “small achievement.
Mr. Shah rubbished AITC’s claim of ushering in “parivartan” (change) in Bengal and said that she was preoccupied in worrying about the “Bangladeshi infiltrators.”
Elaborating the effects of such “infiltration”, he claimed that if one such “infiltrator” manages to settle in Bengal it causes a youth from the State his “education, employment and increases poverty.” This becomes significant as prior to the Lok Sabha elections Ms. Banerjee and Prime Minister Narendra Modi got involved in a verbal spat over the issue.
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BJP State president Rahul Sinha, who was present at the rally, slammed the AITC of conspiring to get Muslim votes by cheating the community. “But Muslims have seen thorough AITC’s ploy,” said Mr. Sinha.
He alleged that an alliance between the AITC and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) was on the cards to prevent the rise of the BJP in the State.