KOLKATA: If mind games could win elections, then the Bharatiya Janata Party would win in West Bengal in a canter.
Even two days after a high drama voting in Nandigram, where chief minister and Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee is pitted against her confidante-turned-rival Suvendu Adhikari, the saffron party continues to claim that she will lose from the prestigious seat.
Addressing a rally in South 24-Parganas on Saturday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Mamata should accept defeat in Nandigram and that if she decides to contest from another seat, she would lose from there also.
Her twin defeat would lead to the Trinamool’s disappearance from Bengal’s political landscape, he added.
Earlier, union home minister Amit Shah, BJP chief J P Nadda and other heavyweights of the saffron camp have also talked in the same vein. With six phases of polling yet to go, the attempt is to make Trinamool workers and voters into actually believing this will happen, leaving them demoralized.
Even if half the supporters of Mamata are convinced, it could play into the saffron party’s hands.
“Mamata Banerjee is the one and only face of the party. Now we are going to face elections in south Bengal districts in the next few phases, which is known as the TMC’s strongholds. If a message can be delivered that her defeat is imminent, her followers and the ruling party’s voters will get scared and subsequently, it will give us electoral dividend in the next phases,” a BJP leader said.
"From your home, you went to Nabanna on a scooter. Then you went to Nandigram where you are going to lose with a huge margin. Defeat is standing in front you. Accept it Didi. I have heard that a section of your educated party colleagues is now saying your decision to contest from Nandigram was a wrong,” Modi said.
The PM’s scooter ride remark was a reference to Mamata’s protest held in Kolkata against rising fuel prices before the announcement of the elections. As a mark of protest, the CM ditched her car and rode pillion on a scooter while going to the secretariat.
“I also heard you are planning to contest from another seat. If you do, it will be another wrong decision Didi. Because your twin defeat will lead to the TMC’s disappearance from the electoral landscape of West Bengal,” Modi added.
Shah and Nadda campaigned in the same breath. On Friday, Shah said he had come to know from Trinamool insiders that Mamata was planning to contest from another seat.
A few days earlier Nadda echoed the same.
Trinamool MP and spokesperson Saugata Roy said the BJP was trying to play the game of fear psychosis but this would not work.
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