KOLKATA: During his two-day Bengal visit this week, Union Home Minister Amit Shah would up the ante against Trinamool Congress over the attack on BJP’s national president JP Nadda’s motorcade and lay stress on the "breakdown’" of law and order in the state, a major plank of the party’s campaign in the upcoming assembly elections.
Shah is likely to visit Visva Bharati University at Santiniketan in Birbhum district and hold a roadshow in the TMC’s stronghold. Sources in the Bengal BJP said Shah might address a rally in Bongaon, the area with high concentration of Hindu Bangladeshi refugees who belong to Matua religious sect, where Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had addressed a rally last week to woo the electorates. Matuas, in 2019 Lok Sabha elections, shifted their political allegiance to the BJP from the ruling TMC.
The BJP bagged two Lok Sabha seats, Bongaon and Ranaghat, where concentration of Hindu refugee electorate is high, by promising to implement the contentious Citizenship (Amendment) Act and give them citizenship.
Since the act is yet to be implemented, the saffron camp is feeling that there is discontent among the Hindu refugee voters in the region, and Shah’s Bongaon visit is said to be a move to retain the vote-bank.
BJP Bengal functionaries said Shah’s visit must be seen in the context of the attack on Nadda’s convoy in Diamond Harbour.
“The attack on our party’s national president not only gave us political mileage, but it will also secure electoral dividend,’’ said a BJP leader. The saffron camp is gearing up to portray the attack on Nadda’s motorcade as a reflection of lawlessness.
Meanwhile, the state BJP has launched an outreach drive by issuing ‘job assurance card’ to youth.
“Our workers will meet atleast 75 lakh unemployed youths. We will give them word that their issue will be given first priority once the BJP will come to power in Bengal,’’ said party’s vice president Mukul Roy.
VIJAYVARGIYA WANTS CENTRAL FORCES IN STATE
Claiming that Mamata Banerjee is “banking on violence” to return to power, BJP national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya on Sunday said central forces should be deployed immediately in West Bengal to put an end to the prevailing atmosphere of political violence