The Centre thinks that Bengal’s ruling Trinamool Congress is trying to delay the State panchayat elections to evade a defeat.
Addressing a public gathering in Siliguri, Union Minister Jairam Ramesh on Sunday said the delaying tactic by the Trinamool Congress to hold panchayat elections would only result in Bengal losing thousands of crores of rupees in terms of Central grants.
launching a prickling attack on the Trinamool Congress for allegedly jeopardising the rural poll process, Ramesh said, “This drama of delaying the panchayat elections can have only one meaning: That is fear of facing the people.”
He said the ruling party of Bengal which roared to power barely a couple of years ago with two-third majority had performed so poorly that the voters have started airing their contempt for its leaders the Union Minister maintained.
“The leaders are not confident of winning the elections because they know that the people who voted them to power are turning their faces away because of their misdeeds, which is why this government has become nervous about conducting panchayat elections lest their dwindling mass base gets exposed,” he maintained.
The Trinamool Congress walked out of the UPA-II alliance following differences between the Congress leadership and Bengal chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on a host of issues including lack of central grants to the State, rising fertiliser prices, FDI in retail trade.
The five-year tenure of the sitting panchayat bodies ends in mid June this year before which fresh elections have to be conducted failing which the three-tier panchayat body will go into the hands of administrators.
Ramesh said the failure of the Government to hold rural elections would end up in the State losing several thousand crores in terms of central grants in various schemes. “If the State fails to ensure elections and in the absence of elected panchayats certain central grants under schemes like MNREGA will not come. This will hit the development work and the rural poor hard” Ramesh said.
The unusually harsh statement from Ramesh who otherwise enjoys better chemistry with the top Trinamool leadership including the Chief Minister and Panchayat Minister Subroto Mukherjee gains significance indicating the Congress and the Trinamool were unlikely to come close at least in the near future.
The polls got deferred after the State Election Commission moved the High Court following its differences with the Government on a number of issues. While the SEC wanted three-phase polls the Government was for two-phase exercise. While the Commission demanded 800 companies of central forces quoting reports of SPs and DMs that indicated at the volatile political situation in the State, the Government insisted on holding the poll with the help of its own forces. Apart from this the Commission also demanded the scrapping of certain sections of the panchayat election Act.
Meanwhile the State Panchayat Minister on Sunday said the Government would not change its stance on panchayat elections and again attacked the Commission for unnecessarily delaying the elections.
“They are fighting the law suits against the Government with the money being provided by it,” he said adding the Government was prepared to carry on the legal battle. “The battle will continue in the single bench and then in the appellate stage and so on,” he insisted.