Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday launched a scathing attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his “ally” Mamata Banerjee the Bengal Chief Minister accusing them of their arrogant ways and charging them with “making tall promises but doing nothing.”
Addressing election rallies at Canning in South 24 Parganas and Serampore in Hooghly district, Gandhi said both “BJP and the Trinamool are two sides of the same coin being arrogant and spoilers of democracy.”
Apart from launching the routine attack on her political adversaries from election rallies the Congress president seemed to create history appealing for the first time to the public to “vote for” what she said was “laal Jhanda”, and bring the Congress to power “for the sake of democracy and development.”
The “milibhagat” of Modi and Mamata was “dangerous for democracy and Bengal” Gandhi said adding like the Bengal Chief Minister “Modi had shown in you golden dreams but did nothing.” Today she said “there is a desperate need to remain cautious about these two anti-democratic forces one led by Modi and the other led by Mamata.”
Singling out Banerjee for betraying the people of she said “in 2011 Mamata Banerjee made some promises and we had believed in them. But after coming to power she changed showed her true colours. Today she has not only finished the democratic fabric of the State but also filled it with corruption.”
The Trinamool Congress was talking about development but “is there any real development in Bengal” Gandhi asked saying the industries had fled the State and farmers were committing suicide.
“She has given only unemployment, crime and corruption to your State” the Congress president said reminding how the structures the Government had made in the name of development were coming down “as in the case of the Vivekananda Fly-over in Kolkata.”
The Trinamool was such a fish which had sullied the whole pond” and so the dirty fish had to be thrown out Gandhi said.
Aware that there was a big down-turn in Hilsa — Bengal’s delicate fish — trade causing loss of millions to the locals Gandhi said how both Modi and Mamata had prohibited the Indian trawlers from catching the exquisite fish but allowed the neighbouring countries to catch our fish.
“This has not only harmed the local economy but also forced Bengal to import this fish from outside,” she said, wondering “how the Prime Minister would protect the Indian borders when he cannot save the Indian fish.”
Gandhi said “like Modiji says nothing was done in the 60 years before he came to power Mamata says none did anything for Bengal before her,” adding “the twin forces of arrogance were danger for democracy and secular fabric of our culture and should be removed from power.”
In both her rallies senior CPI(M) leaders like Sujan Chakrabarty and Rabin Deb were present. Meanwhile in a related development poll-related violence continued in various parts of Bengal with the Trinamool Congress goons attacking the Opposition supporters. At Barrackpore the house of a Jadavpur University professor who worked as a polling agent of CPI(M) candidate from North Dum Dum Tanmoy Bhattacharya was attacked and damaged.
Similar attacks were carried out on Congress and left supporters at Kandi in Murshidabad, Sankrail and Domjur in Howrah, De Ganga in North 24 Parganas and other places, sources said.