It's all lies and slander, says Buddhadeb

By Ananya Dutta

KOLKATA: West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee on Tuesday launched a scathing attack on the Trinamool Congress for “being a party of grotesque lies and slander.”

“Here is a political party [Trinamool Congress] that is surviving on lies….How long will the people of West Bengal accept these lies? I believe that they will on no account accept the grotesque lies and slander of this party,” Mr. Bhattacharjee said at a rally to commemorate the death of 80 supporters of the Left parties during a protest demanding food in the city in 1959.

Mr. Bhattacharjee cited several examples of “unfounded claims” made by Ms. Banerjee — the Communist Party of India (Marxist) was responsible for incidents such as the devastating fire at the Stephen Court, the Jnaneswari Express derailment, the accident in Sainthia and the disruption of her convoy on her return from Lalgarh.

“Lies, all lies,” he emphatically declared to a stadium full of supporters, who responded with a thundering applause.

The Trinamool was a party “without a policy or agenda” and it solely depended on Ms. Banerjee's word. The State had already suffered many losses because of them, Mr. Bhattacharjee said.

Referring to the Trinamool-led agitations in Singur and Nandigram, he said: “Everyone in West Bengal knows the losses that the State has suffered. Shall we accept more of these injustices? The nexus between the Trinamool and Maoists began in Nandigram where we could not defeat them and had to retreat……It will have to be seen if we can limit them to the Jangalmahal region or will the joint army of the Trinamool and Maoists convert all of West Bengal into Jangalmahal.”

Several people in the State had begun to believe in the lies being spread by the Trinamool and it was the responsibility of the supporters of the Left parties to reach out to them and convince them otherwise, he added.

Farmer abandoned

Mr. Bhattacharjee raised concerns at food security and the abdication of responsibility by the Centre.

“The Centre has abandoned the farmer. It is not even spending what was spent earlier in the form of subsidies,” he said. The country's agricultural productivity had dropped over the last few years.

He questioned the Centre's claim that agricultural productivity would increase fourfold, adding that a situation was arising wherein the country's food security would be on the brink of a breakdown.

“While rice and wheat are rotting in the godowns of the Food Corporation of India, people will be forced to die of starvation,” he said.

Mr. Bhattacharjee appealed to the Centre to release funds under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act to drought-affected West Bengal.

THE HINDU, 1st Sept. 2010