KOLKATA: Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee has ruled out any alliance with Congress or the Left parties against BJP for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. “Trinamool Congress will form an alliance with people,” Banerjee said on Thursday soon after the Sagardighi bypoll result was announced.
“A vote for Congress and CPM is a vote for BJP,” Banerjee said, alleging “vote transfer from BJP to Congress” in Sagardighi bypoll. “The truth has come out today,” she added, referring to TMC’s defeat by Congress in Sagardighi. “This (the bypoll result) is a lesson for all of us that we should not listen to Congress or CPM. We cannot go with those who are with BJP,” she said, calling the “tacit Congress-Left-BJP understanding” an “immoral alliance”.
BJP’s vote share in Sagardighi poll in 2021 was 22% and the party transferred a part of its votes, “like about 13%”, to Congress in the bypoll, She alleged. “CPM and Congress were (anyway) together. And now BJP vote too has been transferred to Congress. How can Congress fight BJP if there is an immoral alliance? How will Left Front fight BJP? How can we say they are anti-BJP if they want to defeat Banerjee with BJP’s help?” she said, accusing all three parties of playing “the communal card”. Referring to this as “a give-and-take relationship”, Banerjee said: “They will gain nothing out of it. This is a drama of political trickery. This is a drama of misinformation and falsehood (against Trinamool).”