While Trinamool supremo Mamata Banerjee announced she would go solo in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls in West Bengal, the Congress on January 24 said an Opposition alliance without the West Bengal Chief Minister “cannot be imagined”.
The Congress also described the Trinamool Congress as a “strong pillar” of the INDIA bloc. While addressing a press conference, Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said the INDIA bloc would fight like an alliance in West Bengal.
"Mamata Banerjee said that we want to defeat the BJP, and we will do anything to defeat the BJP. Rahul Gandhi clearly said that Mamata Ji and the TMC are strong pillars of the INDIA bloc. We cannot imagine the INDIA bloc without Mamata Ji," said Ramesh.
The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) also stressed the importance of Mamata’s presence in the INDIA bloc. "Mamata Banerjee's party (TMC) is the biggest and ruling party of (West) Bengal that contests against Congress and Left Front. As both of these parties are in the INDIA bloc, the seat-sharing will be complex. But soon this will all be resolved, and the INDIA bloc will contest together in the election," Delhi Minister Saurabh Bharadwaj said.
Meanwhile, the BJP’s IT cell shared a post on the social media platform X. "Unable to hold her political ground, Mamata Banerjee wants to fight all seats, in the hope that she can still be relevant, after the polls...," stated BJP's IT Cell chief Amit Malviya posted on X.
A senior Trinamool leader, on condition of anonymity, told PTI, "(Ms Banerjee) said don't think about seat-sharing with Congress... she said she offered two seats but they demanded 10-12.”
Mamata Banerjee’s decision to fight alone in West Bengal is a sign of desperation. Unable to hold her political ground, she wants to fight all seats, in the hope that she can still be relevant, after the polls.Related stories
Much against her desire, to emerge as the face of the Opposition…
— Amit Malviya (@amitmalviya) January 24, 2024
Trinamool spokesperson Kunal Ghosh too had recently warned the Congress against "unjustified bargaining".
Also read: Lok Sabha Election 2024: Congress-AAP deal in limbo over 20 seats in Delhi and Punjab
Recently, Bengal Congress chief Adhir Ranjan Choudhury said the party would fight the polls without Banerjee’s help. "We won't fight the election with Mamata's help. Congress knows how to fight on its own strength, and Mamata Banerjee should remember that it was with Congress's support she came to power in Bengal," he said.
However, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi rubbished the rumours of differences with Trinamool Congress. “Mamata Banerjee is very close to me and our party," he told reporters in Assam, through which his Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra is currently passing. "Yes, sometimes, Congress and Trinamool Congress leaders criticise each other's party. But they are natural things, it happens. But they are not going to disrupt the relations between the Congress and the TMC," he said.
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