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By the time assembly elections are held in West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee will be left alone in her Trinamool Congress, Union Home Minister Amit Shah asserted Saturday as a battery of TMC leaders including the redoubtable Suvendu Adhikari joined the Bharatiya Janata Party.
Adhikari, the foremost TMC leader with a mass base after Banerjee, shifted allegiance to the BJP, besides nine MLAs, including five of the ruling party, and a Trinamool Congress Lok Sabha member in Shah's presence.
The TMC's slogan of "Maa, Mati, Manush" (mother, motherland and people) has been reduced to "extortion, corruption and nepotism", Shah said, and exuded confidence that the BJP will form the next government in the state winning over 200 seats.
West Bengal has a 294-member assembly.
"When the people of Bengal are rallying behind the BJP to transform the state why is she worried? This is just the beginning. These people are leaving your party voluntarily.
"The way leaders are deserting your party, by the time elections are held, Mamata Banerjee will be left alone in the TMC," Shah said, taking a swipe at Banerjee.
"The kind of tsunami I see today, you would have never imagined," an elated Shah said as Adhikar nodded in approval.
Shah said leaders and workers of rival political parties were joining the BJP because of the TMC's "politics of appeasement and nepotism".
"Good people from the Congress, Trinamool, CPI(M).... all under the leadership of Suvendu Bhai, have joined BJP today to work under the leadership of Narendra Modi ji," he said.
Mocking Banerjee's allegation that the BJP was trying to engineer defections in her party, Shah wondered whether forming the TMC after quitting the Congress in 1998 was not defection.
"Senior party members are leaving TMC. Mamata didi is accusing the BJP of engineering defections. We are not doing any such thing. But I want to ask her when she quit the Congress to form TMC, wasn't it defection? This is just the beginning. She will be left alone by the time election arrives," Shah said.
Lashing out at "dynasty politics" in the TMC, Shah alleged that Banerjee has changed its slogan from "Maa, Mati, Manush" to "appeasement, family fiefdom and tolabaazi (extortion)."
BJP will form next govt in Bengal: Suvendu Adhikari
BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari on Saturday vowed to oust the Mamata Banerjee regime in the 2021 assembly elections in West Bengal, exuding confidence that his new party will form the next government.
Adhikari claimed that the TMC came into existence because of the saffron party.
"I had first met Amit Shah during the 2014 Lok Sabha polls... When I was down with COVID, my former party did not enquire about my health, while Amit Shah twice enquired about how I am," he said addressing the rally.
Noting that the BJP believes in nationalism and pluralism, Adhikari alleged that the TMC wants to divide the state on the lines of "insider" and "outsider".
"Shame on the TMC for such narrow politics," Adhikari said as the crowd roared.
"I am being called a traitor by those who themselves (TMC) are traitors. Had the BJP not been there, TMC would have never come into existence. In the next assembly polls, BJP will win Bengal and TMC will be defeated," he said.
Adhikari, the foremost TMC leader with a mass base after Banerjee, shifted allegiance to the BJP, besides nine MLAs, including five of the ruling party, and a Trinamool Congress Lok Sabha member in Shah's presence.
The TMC's slogan of "Maa, Mati, Manush" (mother, motherland and people) has been reduced to "extortion, corruption and nepotism", Shah said, and exuded confidence that the BJP will form the next government in the state winning over 200 seats.
West Bengal has a 294-member assembly.
"When the people of Bengal are rallying behind the BJP to transform the state why is she worried? This is just the beginning. These people are leaving your party voluntarily.
"The way leaders are deserting your party, by the time elections are held, Mamata Banerjee will be left alone in the TMC," Shah said, taking a swipe at Banerjee.
"The kind of tsunami I see today, you would have never imagined," an elated Shah said as Adhikar nodded in approval.