Give us over 35 seats in 2024, Bengal govt will get derailed before 2025: Amit Shah
KOLKATA, APRIL 15: Eyeing the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Friday sounded the poll bugle in Bengal, setting a target of over 35 seats out of 42, encouraging to bring the BJP into power and electing Narendra Modi as the Prime Minister.
He claimed that Mamata Banerjee’s government in Bengal would get derailed before 2025.
“People of Bengal have given us 77 seats in the Assembly elections and it is a great responsibility. Give more than 35 seats to the BJP in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections and ensure Modiji becomes Prime Minister again. The only way to stop the crimes of Didi-Bhaipo (Mamata and her nephew Abhishek Banerjee) is to bring the BJP into power. It is the only political force to free Bengal from infiltration, cow smuggling and corruption. Bring the BJP in power in 2024 and Mamata Banerjee’s government will collapse before 2025,” said Shah while addressing a rally in Suri in Birbhum district.
Referring to the violence during Ram Navami processions in Howrah and Hooghly, Shah slammed the TMC-led government. “The attack on Ram Navami processions was a TMC fallout and its politics of appeasement. If you bring us in power, I can assure you that no one will dare unleash an attack on Ram Navami,” he said.
Shah, however, did not talk about the issue of panchayat elections slated to be held in May in the state. It appears that the saffron camp is not aiming for the rural polls as the Lok Sabha elections are the priority.
Hitting out at Mamata and Abhishek, Shah said, “Didi doesn’t care about youth in Bengal. Her only target is to make her nephew the next CM of the state. Didi can dream as much as she can but it will be BJP that’ll come to power.”
‘Unconstitutional threat’
Shah’s comments drew sharp reactions from the TMC, which asked how a union minister could “openly threaten to topple an elected government.”
“He can dream of winning 35 seats, just like bagging 200 plus seats in the 2021 assembly polls. How can a union minister openly threaten to topple an elected government before it completes its full term? It is now proven that a conspiracy is on to topple the state government,” TMC spokesperson Kunal Ghosh said.
The Mamata Banerjee government is scheduled to complete its third term in 2026 and her party’s leaders saw the 2025 ouster claim made in a speech ahead of Bengal’s panchayat polls as an “unconstitutional” threat.
Referring to Shah’s attack on TMC on the issue of dynasty politics, Ghosh said, “It seems Shah has forgotten that its leader in Bengal, Suvendu Adhikari himself, is a product of dynasty politics.”
Suvendu is the son of Sisir Adhikari, a TMC MP, who has joined the BJP. Several of his family members are also political leaders in Bengal.
The BJP had won 18 of the 42 Lok Sabha seats in West Bengal in the 2019 elections and observers said doubling this number would require an immense organisational challenge.
-PTI
