Mamata threatens to protest in Delhi if barred in Kolkata; flays expelled MLA as 'betrayer'

Trinamool Congress (TMC) supremo Mamata Banerjee on Monday (June 1) said if the state police refused her party to hold protests in Kolkata over the physical attacks on senior MPs such as Abhishek Banerjee and Kalyan Banerjee on Tuesday (June 2), she would go to New Delhi herself to demonstrate.

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The former chief minister of West Bengal said the police did not permit them to protest the attacks that took place this weekend. She claimed a “police raj” was prevailing in the state, which saw the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) coming to power for the first time in this year’s elections.

Cops denied permission for June 2 event: Mamata

Virtually addressing party workers and supporters, Mamata said her party had sought permission to stage a protest at Rani Rashmani Road, but the police had refused. She said it was politically motivated and threatened to hold it in the national capital. The TMC chief also accused the police of helping the ruling party to weaken the TMC by intimidating and arresting its workers.

Mamata said Tuesday’s protest was of around 100 people, but the police denied permission.

The 71-year-old leader, who has in the past held protests in New Delhi and was also her party’s lone MP in the Lok Sabha once (2004-09), talked tough two days after her nephew Abhishek was assaulted and injured in Sonarpur in South 24 Parganas district near Kolkata on Saturday (May 30). The next day, Kalyan, the party’s chief whip in the Lower House, was targeted in Hooghly district, his own constituency.

Targeting the BJP, Mamata said the assaults were aimed at assassinating the duo. She alleged complete lawlessness in the state and warned that the TMC would not be weakened if the opponents snatched one or two MLAs. “We will emerge stronger,” she thundered.

Mamata, who was left disappointed after three-fourths of her party’s elected MLAs did not turn up at a meeting at her residence in Kalighat in Kolkata on Sunday and sources in the TMC said the legislators were busy protesting the attacks on Abhishek and Kalyan and accused the police of creating hurdles for them, said the TMC workers were being prevented from doing their day-to-day political activities.

Mamata accuses BJP of unfair poll win, again

The TMC supremo also reiterated her claims that the BJP won the state polls unfairly, alleging several seats had been looted. According to her, she was also winning in her previous seat of Bhabanipur in Kolkata when she was chased out. Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari defeated her in that seat.

She also said that the repoll in Falta in South 24 Parganas, which the TMC lost badly, on May 21, was caused by arrests and intimidation. She said 500 of the TMC’s agents had been arrested and the party’s candidate was threatened. The TMC’s Jahangir Khan withdrew from the contest days before the repolling, and the BJP won it with a thumping margin of more than a one lakh votes. The TMC was pushed to the fourth position, behind the Left and the Congress.

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Mamata said that 12 TMC workers had been killed since the Assembly elections and that thousands of party activists had been arrested, while many others had been forced to flee their homes.

State handed over to 'lumpens': TMC supremo

She said the police were enabling lawlessness and suppressing the opposition, while the administration was running a lawless government. According to her, the state has been handed over to “lumpens” and is suffering economically.

TMC MLA and spokesperson Kunal Ghosh said the party’s programme on Tuesday, and they wrote to the police seeking punishment. But when the decorators arrived at the site to set up the stage, the police arrived and said no permission had been granted.

The TMC also expelled two of its newly elected MLAs on Monday for alleged anti-party activities in connection with the forged signature case in connection with a fabricated resolution letter supposedly signed by 70 MLAs endorsing Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay as the Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly.

Mamata tears into Ritabrata, one of the expelled MLAs

Mamata took a swipe at one of the two expelled legislators, Ritabrata Banerjee, a former CPI(M) member who was also expelled by the Left party in 2017, saying the party had erred in giving him a ticket for this year’s election.

“I thank the CPI(M) for expelling him. Our mistake was giving him a ticket after he came and fell at my feet seeking an opportunity. We trusted him and even denied tickets to others to accommodate him. Today he has betrayed the party and the people who elected him,” Mamata said.

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“We are happy that they have left. We will rebuild the party. Such people were never our assets," she added.

The other expelled MLA, Sandipan Saha, also spoke out against the TMC, saying anybody who speaks of morality is deemed anti-party.

Some local reports, meanwhile, claimed that many TMC MLAs were with Ritabrata and might together form an alternative platform.

(With agency inputs)