A day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi said “Maut ka khel (game ofmurder)” can never fetch votes an irked Trnamool Congress reactedsaying it was the BJP and not the Trinamool Congress which was unleashing violence in Bengal to win the next year’s Assembly elections.
Senior leader and TMC spokesperson Sougato Roy on Thursday said thathis party had been a victim of political violence since its inception.“First it was the CPI(M) and now it is the BJP which is perpetratingpolitical violence in Bengal and targeting the Trinamool,” Roy saidadding it was the BJP “and not the TMC which is unleashing violence inthe state.”
Incidentally Roy’s remarks came almost in tandem with an attack onState BJP president Dilip Ghosh’s convoy at Jaigaon in Alipurduardistrict of North Bengal where his vehicle and those of other partyleaders were stoned by alleged supporters of Gorkha Janmukti Morcha(Bimal Gurung) which had recently left the NDA and joined hands withthe Trinamool Congress.
Swearing by Mahatma Gandhi the TMC MP said that his party did notbelieve in violence. “It believes in peace. We would request the PrimeMinister to give his advice to the Bengal BJP unit to maintainpolitical decorum.”
Modi had earlier said that “Maut ka khel" (game of murder) cannotfetch votes to a political party,” even as he said without naming anyoutfit that, "the people who aren’t able to challenge us in ademocratic way, have taken the path of killing our workers. In someparts of the country, they think they can realise their goals bykilling BJP workers. But killing game cannot get votes.”
Bengal BJP which won 19 out of 42 parliamentary seats displacing theLeft as the main opposition force in the State is eyeing two-third majority in the next year’s Assembly in Bengal.
On Union Home Minister Amit Shah setting a target of 200 out of 294Assembly seats for the BJP in 2021 State polls, Roy said, “He (Shah)has no inkling of what he is saying. BJP will never be able to formgovernment in Bengal. This is Bengal, things are not going to be easyfor them here.”
Meanwhile, the BJP youth wing staged protests all across the State onThursday evening after Ghosh was black-flagged and his vehicle wasattacked with brickbats in North Bengal’s Alipurduar district, sourcessaid.
Ghosh was returning from his routine “chai pe charcha (discussion overtea cup) programme. Vehicle of local BJP MLA Wilson Chapramari wasalso damaged in the attack, sources said even as Ghosh later said,“The TMC and their friends are getting desperate as they can sensedefeat in the upcoming assembly polls. However such tactics won'twork. People are with us.”
Such attacks by the ruling party and its allies proved that law andorder had collapsed in the State, he said while State Governor JagdeepDhankhar too condemned the attack saying “leaders of no politicalparty should be attacked” and that “it is the duty of the Stateadministration to ensure safety and security of all the politicalparties.”