The Trinamool Congress held a huge rally today in Bengal's Nandigram, venturing into the territory it lost to BJP's Suvendu Adhikari in the state elections. The coming panchayat polls in the state will be seen as litmus test before next year's general election and the Trinamool is determined to put up a good show in the area where Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had lost a straight fight with her aide-turned rival two years ago.
Party MP and Mamata Banerjee's nephew Abhishek Banerjee, who led the 20-km rally in Nandigram as part of the party's Nabo Jowar (New Wave) campaign, alleged that Suvendu Adhikari had won through "load-shedding" -- hinting at electoral malpractice.
"The results of 2021 Bengal elections in Nandigram were falsified. The people of this land know exactly what happened," he said. In the next election, the Trinamool candidate will win by over 50,000 votes, added the leader, who is on a statewide public outreach march called the "Jono Sanjog Yatra".
Mr Adhikari is yet to respond.
While Mr Banerjee was touring Nandigram, he had visited Garh Salboni in Jhargram district, where the Trinamool leader's convoy was attacked last week, and met families of the people arrested in the case.
"The CPM government did it here, and now the TMC government is doing it -- detaining people without trial. I stopped it that time, and will do it now as well," he was quoted as saying by news agency Press Trust of India.
"Poor people are being tortured here. This cannot go on. People of all political parties are there within the Kurmi community. Divisions are being created between tribals and Kurmis," he said, promising the families of those arrested all kinds of assistance, reported PTI.
The Nandigram and Singur agitations against land acquisition had catapulted Mamata Banerjee to power in 2011, after CPM's 35-year regime in the state. Suvendu Adhikari, an aide of Mamata Banerjee during the Nandigram agitation, quit the party in 2021 and joined the BJP.
In the elections that followed, Ms Banerjee had contested from Nandigram – a move that had drawn eyeballs and recharged the party.
A case challenging Mr Adhikari's victory in the election is pending in the Calcutta High Court.
But Nandigram is back in focus again ahead of next year's general election, which will be crucial for Trinamool.
In the 2019 election, the BJP had managed to win 18 of Bengal's 42 Lok Sabha seats – pushing CPM to the third spot in the state and posing serious challenge to Trinamool.
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