Reflecting on the journey of 23 years, Ms. Banerjee said, “Our years have been of immense struggle, but throughout this time we have continued to achieve our objective of being committed to the cause of only the people”.
Senior Trinamool Congress leaders unfurled the party flag at its headquarters in Kolkata and pointed out that the 2021 Assembly polls in West Bengal are very crucial for party.
“We have an election before us and it is an election to fight for democracy and constitutional values under the leadership of Mamata Banerjee. The whole country is eagerly looking at the outcome of the elections,” Trinamool Congress general secretary Subrata Bakshi said. Mr Bakshi said the elections will be crucial for the next Lok Sabha polls in the country in 2024.
From January 2, the West Bengal government will start the second phase of Duare Sarkar (Government at door steps), an outreach programme of welfare schemes which the State government and the party claim has achieved huge success. Political observers in West Bengal said the ruling party is facing its biggest challenge in Assembly polls since it came to power in 2011.
State BJP president Dilip Ghosh said the TMC does not understand what democracy is. Referring to the defections in the TMC, Mr. Ghosh said if the party understood what democracy was there would not be so many defections in the party.
Governor’s plea
West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar on Friday called upon the administrative apparatus to ensure that the Assembly polls are “violence free”. Observing that there are fears that the elections will be “tainted by violence”, Mr. Dhankhar said the role of a public servant is to work for the public and it will be a blow to democracy “if public servants are involved in political work”.
