Mamata Banerjee on Monday launched a scathing counter attack on the BJP Government after Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Sunday slammed the Chief Minister for running a Government of extortionists and rioters in Bengal.
Launching a blistering attack on the Centre, Banerjee said that the BJP was trying to repeat the “Gujarat model” (refer to Ahmedabad riots) throughout India even as she referred to the Delhi riots. “I am deeply anguished at what happened in Delhi where so many people were killed. What happened there was a planned genocide,” Banerjee said adding how the BJP was trying to implement the Gujarat model in Bengal which she would not allow them to do.
Her speech came a day after Shah vowed to conquer Bengal in the next year’s Assembly elections. She was addressing a ‘strategy meeting’ of party workers in Kolkata where the TMC launched special 75-day campaign called “Banglar Garbo Mamata (Bengal’s pride Mamata) conceived by pollster Prashant Kishore.
“Delhi is just as big as a municipality if compared to bigger states like Bengal. And they cannot control law and order there. And shamelessly they have come to conquer Bengal instead of apologizing for allowing so many deaths to happen in Delhi. Even today some bodies were found in the drains in North-east Delhi,” she said reminding how Delhi Police which reported to the Centre and not the Delhi Government was responsible for all that happened.
Shah had on Sunday had linked Delhi riots to Bengal violence post enactment of CAA in December 2019 when several trains and railway stations were torched.
Apparently referring to his speech Banerjee on Monday said Bengal was an absolutely peaceful state and the people here enjoyed communal harmony unlike the states ruled by the BJP adding the people of Bengal would never vote for a communal outfit.
Banerjee also attacked the Bengal BJP leadership for trying to fan communal hatred in the State and bringing the “goli maro” (shoot the traitors) slogan from Delhi to Kolkata and said strong actions would be taken against those who raised such slogans from Shah’s rally on Sunday.
“Remember this is Bengal and not Delhi. We will not allow you to create a communal problem here. The people of Bengal will resist you with all their might and the Government will not spare those who raise such slogans to create disturbance,” Banerjee said. “The Goli Maaro slogans are illegal, scary and provocative and aimed at creating communal hatred. We will take strong action against those who did it. No one will be spared,” she said wondering who the real “gaddars’ (traitors) were.
“It is not the BJP but the people to decide who the real gaddar or traitors are,” she said.
In fact the police had arrested three persons for raising the “goli maro” slogan from Shah’s rally on Sunday. “In Delhi, BJP leaders who gave provocative slogans have not been arrested, but I got three of the BJP workers arrested,” she said.
The three BJP workers identified as Surendra Tiwari, Dhruba Basu and Pankaj Prasad were arrested and produced at a local court. While the court granted Surendra Tiwari and Pankaj Prasad two days of police custody as demanded by the police the third BJP worker – Dhruba Basu was granted bail on grounds of his old age.
However referring to the arrests Bengal BJP president Dilip Ghosh on Monday said the Chief Minister had no courage to arrest the people who had committed the violence in December. The Bengal BJP had earlier disowned the Sunday’s sloganeers saying they were in fact planted by the CPI(M) and the Congress.
Meanwhile, the Left and the Congress questioned Banerjee’s sincerity in combating BJP’s communal politics even as CPI(M) politburo member on Monday wondered “how she changes her colours at the drop of hat.
Two days ago she was sharing dinner with Amit Shah at Bhubaneshwar despite the Delhi riots and two days later she is changing her voice here.”