'Congress is in BJP's pocket in Assam'

'Most senior Congress leaders in Assam have a secret understanding with the BJP.'
'They are hobnobbing with the chief minister for their self-interest.'

In a big jolt to the Congress party, Ripun Bora, president of the Assam Pradesh Congress Committee, quit the party to join the Trinamool Congress this week.

His quitting the party came as a surprise as Bora had been with the Congress for 40 years.

The move came after Bora lost the Rajya Sabha election this month to the United People's Party Liberal's candidate Rwngwra Narzary, who was supported by the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Before the election, Bora was confident of victory as the combined Opposition had 44 MLA votes. He needed only 43 votes to defeat the UPPL candidate, but still lost due to cross-voting.

"I am seeing the Congress getting smashed by the BJP's ideology day by day... Therefore, I thought whatever my energy and calibre is left after serving the Congress for 40 years, should not go waste and therefore I joined the TMC which is much better placed to take on the BJP," Ripun Bora tells Syed Firdaus Ashraf/Rediff.com.

Why do you think the Trinamool Congress is better placed to take on the BJP in Assam than the Congress?

I was in the Congress for 40 years and especially after 2014, I am seeing there is a great threat to our country's democracy and Constitution.

The threat is also to the social fabric of our country and the economy which is going downhill.

I am seeing the Congress getting smashed by the BJP's ideology day by day.

As the grand old party of India, we should have prevented this rise of the BJP, but we did not and in future too I am not hopeful.

Instead of fighting the BJP unitedly, Congressmen are fighting among themselves.

The BJP is taking advantage of this and therefore I thought whatever my energy and calibre is left after serving the Congress for 40 years, should not go waste and therefore I joined the TMC which is much better placed to take on the BJP.

(TMC chief and West Bengal chief minister) Mamata Banerjee has shown the way by how she fought the BJP and won in West Bengal.

So in the same way, I want to take on the BJP in Assam and win the state for the TMC.

Is it because you lost the Rajya Sabha election recently, where the Congress and allies had 44 seats when you needed only 43 seats to win, but still lost?

Most of the senior Congress leaders in Assam have a secret understanding with the BJP.

They are hobnobbing with the Assam chief minister (Himanta Biswa Sarma) for their self-interest and these Congress leaders betrayed the party ideology.

But Congress MLA Siddique Ahmed, who wrote 'one' instead of 1 on the ballot paper due to which you lost the elections, was suspended from the party.
Shouldn't the AIUDF (All India United Democratic Front) MLAs be blamed for your defeat as some of them voted for the BJP-supported Rajya Sabha candidate?

The AIUDF is now exposed in Assam.

It was the AIUDF who suggested and demanded from me that we must not give up on fighting the BJP for the second Rajya Sabha seat.

They said the combined Opposition had 44 MLAs while to win the second Rajya Sabha seat we needed 43 votes.

Therefore, I agreed to contest because they said the Opposition had the magic number with us to win.

They also told Congress working President Sonia Gandhi when they met her that Ripun Bora will win easily. But they changed their track on voting day.

They had 15 MLAs out of which eight MLAs voted for me and other seven members voted for the BJP-supported candidate.

They are exposed all over Assam, and Muslims do not have faith in the AIUDF.

Will you be able to build the TMC in Assam? Do you have a large presence?

In Assam we have to start from zero, but we are determined to take on the BJP.

All Opposition parties have been smashed in Assam by the BJP.

The Congress and AIUDF are in the BJP's pockets.

The people of Assam want a strong Opposition in the state and here the TMC can play an important role.

West Bengal and Assam are bordering states and the people of Assam think that under the TMC they can form an alternative political power to take on the BJP.

What surprises one the most is that the Citizenship (Amendment) Act was strongly opposed by native Assamese because they did not want Bengali Hindus from Bangladesh to get citizenship through this law and they wanted the Assam Accord to be followed, and still the BJP won the 2021 Assam assembly elections.

Those who opposed the CAA voted for us and some did vote for the BJP, but the main anti-CAA vote went to two regional parties -- the Assam Jatiya Parishad and the Raijor Dal.

These parties not only failed to make a mark in the elections, but also ended up helping the BJP by splitting Congress votes.

We lost 17 seats with less than 1,500 votes because of these two parties.

They divided the anti-BJP vote.

But now, I don't think this will be a problem in future as the TMC has come in the picture.

Are you saying this because the vote share of the BJP was 33.3 per cent and the Congress had 29.7 per cent, thus proving you gave a tough fight to the BJP, but lost out on seats as the BJP won 63 and you got just 27?

We fought well, but thereafter Congress leaders of Assam started to behave badly which resulted in the demoralising of Congress workers.

Now, definitely these workers will come to the TMC because they know we can take on the BJP, and you will see that in the coming days.

What happened in March 2022 when the BJP won 73 out of 80 Assam municipalities? The Congress was totally wiped out.

It is a local body election and obviously they won as there was no obstruction from the Congress whose workers and leaders were in no mood to fight the BJP.

Moreover, most of the time local elections are won by the parties that rule the state.

Three days ago you were tweeting Sonia Gandhi's article she wrote against the BJP. What changed in just three days? Did you speak to the Gandhis before quitting?

I will not comment on this issue now, what I spoke or what I did not speak.

This is an internal matter of the party when I was a part of the party.

Three Assamese leaders -- Himanta Biswa Sarma, Sushmita Dev and you -- have quit the Congress in the last seven years. What went wrong for the Congress in Assam?

This too I will not answer.

Only the Congress leadership can answer this question.

Ashok Tanwar from Haryana quit the Congress to join the TMC and in less than four months joined the Aam Aadmi Party.
The TMC lost badly in the Goa elections. In this scenario, do you see the TMC expanding its base out of West Bengal?

Goa and Haryana are different states and they have different issues.

As far as north-east India is concerned, the TMC is the nearest competitor to the BJP.

Assamese and Bengalis have the same kind of food, culture, and everything that you can think of is more or less similar.

Therefore, the TMC is very close to the hearts of the people of the north-east.

You mean there are no Bengali and Assamese ethnic tensions?

No, not at all.

It is only vested interest groups who spread this theory.

There is no conflict between Assamese and Bengalis.