Haldia (West Bengal): Newly-inducted into the party and now BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari filed Friday his nomination from the Nandigram Assembly constituency here. Suvendu Adhikari will be contesting against West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. The one-time protégé of the Trinamool Congress supremo also assured his supporters that he would win by a margin of 50,000 or more votes.
Adhikari filed his papers at the sub-divisional office here after leading a-one-km-long roadshow. Union ministers Dharmendra Pradhan and Smriti Irani took part in the rally before Adhikari filed the nomination papers. Adhikari had won from the Nandigram constituency on a TMC ticket. He had defeated his CPI rival by a margin of 81,230 votes.
Immediately after filing his nomination, Adhikari urged people not to vote for ‘outsiders’ (in this case Banerjee), as he flayed the ruling party for betraying the trust of people.
“I would appeal to all of you to not waste your votes in favour of outsiders. They have betrayed your trust and aspirations after coming to power in 2011,” Adhikari said, without naming Banerjee.
Adhikari claimed that the Trinamool Congress has turned into a private limited company, where other leaders ‘neither have a say in policy-making of the party nor in the state government’.
“Everybody else, apart from the aunt and nephew (Mamata and TMC leader Abhishek Banerjee), are lamp posts in the party,” Adhikari said.
Meanwhile Union Minister Irani slammed Banerjee for being keen in clicking photographs by falsely claiming credit for the central schemes started by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. She wondered whether the people of the state would vote for ‘such a daughter’ who unleashes violence on mothers and masses.
“Will the people vote for such a daughter who unleashes violence on an 80-year-old mother? Will you vote for the daughter (whose party) hangs BJP activists? People of the state are awaiting ‘Asol Poribortan’ (real change),” she said.