Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury
Credit: PTI Photo
Kolkata: The Trinamool Congress may even tie up with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to save its government in West Bengal, the leader of the Congress in the outgoing Lok Sabha, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, said on Sunday, calling the state’s chief minister Mamata Banerjee ‘palti kumari' (queen of switching sides)’.
“Just as Nitish Kumar turned ‘paltu kumar' (king of switching sides) and quit I.N.D.I.A., the ‘Didi’ of Bengal too chose to be ‘palti kumari’ and fled away from the opposition bloc,” Chowdhuri, who also heads the West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee (WBPCC), said in Kolkata, taking a dig at the TMC supremo and the state’s chief minister.
Chowdhury was clearly drawing a parallel between Mamata Banerjee and the Bihar chief minister and Janata Dal (United) leader, Nitish Kumar, who quit the I.N.D.I.A. bloc to re-enter the National Democratic Alliance in January.
Banerjee had played a key role in bringing several opposition parties together under the banner of the I.N.D.I.A. bloc, attended meetings, and even christened the bloc.
But, ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, she refused to spare more than two of the 42 Lok Sabha seats for the Congress in West Bengal. The TMC decided to go solo in all the parliamentary constituencies in the state when its offer was rejected by the Congress, which, however, managed to have an electoral understanding with the CPI(M)-led Left Front.
“I am strongly hopeful that the Congress-Left seat-sharing alliance will be very productive (in West Bengal),” Chowdhury said as he and Left Front chairman Biman Bose, a veteran CPI(M) leader, addressed a joint press conference in Kolkata on Sunday.
Bose said that he was confident that the Congress would transfer its votes to the Left Front candidates this time, unlike the state assembly elections in 2021, when the communists had transferred votes to the grand old party’s nominees, but the reverse did not happen despite the two having an alliance.
The two leaders, however, dodged questions on the war of words between Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and the scions of the Congress’s first family – Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi – in the southern state. They both, however, said that the political realities were different in the two states.
Chowdhury, known to be a strong critic of the TMC supremo, said that the party ruling West Bengal would tumble down like a house of cards if the Congress and the Left Front could perform well in the Lok Sabha elections.
“Don't be surprised if (the) TMC makes a pact with the BJP to save its government in West Bengal in the future,” said the president of West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee. He alleged that the BJP had used the central probe agencies to send chief ministers of Delhi and Jharkhand behind bars but had been handling the allegations of corruption against the TMC general secretary and Banerjee’s nephew Abhishek Banerjee with kid gloves.
He alleged that the TMC and the BJP had a secret understanding that was evident from the saffron party’s decision to field a weak candidate against Abhiskeh in the Diamond Harbour parliamentary constituency of the state.
Chowdhury is contesting in Baharampur, which has been his pocket borough since 1999. The TMC fielded cricketer Yusuf Pathan against him, apparently in a bid to keep him busy in his own constituency and not to allow him to campaign for other candidates of the Congress and the Left Front elsewhere in the state.
“I can make a commitment today that I would quit politics if I lose in Baharampur. But can Mamata Banerjee pledge today that she would own up her party’s candidate’s win or loss in Baharampur as her personal triumph or defeat?” Chowdhury said, challenging the chief minister of West Bengal.