Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s road show in Bolpur today was truly a padayatra
Calcutta:
It’s raining tour shows in Bengal bound for polls.
Strictly speaking, today’s road show by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in Bolpur was truly a padayatra, very different from that of the Union Interior Minister Amit Shah a week ago. He walked 4 km while he was riding in an open van.
Ms Banerjee’s former lieutenant Suvendu Adhikari, who joined the BJP 10 days ago, tried to get over his former boss.
He performed not one but two road shows, Amit Shah-style, in Nandigram and from Titagarh to Khardah, just north of Kolkata.
The vitriol between the prime minister and the new BJP recruit was nearly equal.
He mocked Lord Adhikari. “Just because they throw away cash and buy a couple of Trinamool MLAs, which are also the most rotten, do you think they bought Trinamool Congress?” Ms. Banerjee said. “Get 30 seats first, then we’ll see about 294,” he added.
Mr. Adhikari directed his anger primarily against Trinamool MP Abhishek Banerjee, who is Mamata Banerjee’s nephew.
“Bhaipo (nephew) is mad at me. He says I can’t even make the ‘lotus’ bloom in my own home, how am I going to make it bloom in Bengal?” Said Adhikari.
Mocking Abhishek Banerjee as ‘Babu Shona’, Mr. Adhikari added, “Wait till Ram Navami, wait till Basanti Puja, not only will the lotus bloom in my house, we will enter your house on Harish Chatterjee and Harish Mukherjee streets and do the lotus will blossom. “
Mr. Banerjee lives on Harish Mukherjee Street in South Kolkata, not far from where he grew up in Mamata Banerjee’s house on Harish Chatterjee Street. Ram Navami is a festival in April that the BJP has set out to celebrate in Bengal, Basanti Puja is Saraswati Puja which is usually held in February.
The reference to the lotus not blooming in Mr. Adhikari’s house was a comment from Abhishek Banerjee to the new BJP leader whose father Sisir and brother Dibyendu are Trinamool MPs. Another brother, Soumendu Adhikari, was removed as Kanthi’s municipal president tonight. Kanthi is the seat city of the East Midnapore district, a stronghold of Suvendu Adhikari.
Adhikari supporters have claimed they were attacked on their way to join his tour in Nandigram today. The police called it a fight between the locals and a group of people, which was quickly controlled. BJP leaders claimed that many injured workers were rushed to hospital.
Without naming her, Adhikari mocked Mamata Banerjee this afternoon for canceling their meeting in Nandigram on January 7. The Trinamool has said that the main organizer of the rally, MLA senior Akhil Giri, had contracted coronavirus and therefore Ms Banerjee had postponed her visit. Mr. Adhikari suggested that he did it while he was holding a rally in Nandigram the next day and his would be bigger.
“As long as the canceled rally is held, I will hold a rally in the same place the next day,” he said.
Adhikari’s second road show went from Titagarh to Khardah. It started from the place where BJP youth leader Manish Shukla had been shot and killed on October 4.
The Union Minister of State Babul Supriyo and BJP MPs Arjun Singh and Soumitra Khan shared the open Jeep with Suvendu Adhikari, as well as Mukul Roy’s son Subhrangshu, among others.
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