Karnataka West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Saturday claimed that the election results are the “beginning of the end” for the BJP.
Banerjee also said that the moral of the Karnataka assembly election results is that people “want plurality” and “no central design to dominate” can suppress them.
Adding in for good measure, he said the election results were “a lesson for tomorrow”, implying 2024 parliamentary elections.
His party also took a dig at the BJP’s “double engine” rhetoric of the benefits of a single party rule both at the Center and in the state, a claim the TMC has to contest during elections to the Bengal assembly in 2021, and quipped that Karnataka’s The people had rejected the government, the “engine of trouble”.
Congratulating the people of Karnataka for the mandate in favor of change, Banerjee said “brutal authoritarian and majoritarian” politics has been defeated.
He predicted that the saffron party would also lose in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, where it will face the Congress, which trounced the BJP in Karnataka in results announced on Saturday.
“This is the beginning of the end of the BJP ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. The TMC leader said that people have voted against the arrogance and intolerance of the BJP.
Of the 224 seats in the Karnataka Assembly, the Congress has won 133 seats and is leading in 3 others, while the BJP has so far won 64 seats and is leading in 1 seat in the results announced till 7.45 pm Is going on
After sending off actor Salman Khan who had come to meet her, Banerjee told reporters gathered in front of her house, “I think the saffron party will lose in the upcoming elections in Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh as well.”
In late March this year, the fiery TMC chief had said that she would maintain equal distance from both the BJP and the Congress only to change her stand after Congress leader Rahul Gandhi was disqualified as a Lok Sabha MP.
After a meeting with JD(U) chief Nitish Kumar last month, Banerjee formally announced that she would be part of a joint opposition, including the Congress, that would challenge the BJP in 2024.
His comments on Saturday are being seen not only as a strong attack on the BJP, but also as an indirect endorsement of the Congress as it goes saffron in other key state elections – Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan. Will take the party ahead of the parliamentary elections. Election in 2024.
However, his party, which faces an electoral test in elections to panchayats in all villages and districts of Bengal within the next few months, is trying to present itself as the main opposition to the BJP, at least within the state, and the Congress. Eager to humiliate Area.
Asked about the Congress’s performance in the elections, his nephew and TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee said the people of Karnataka have chosen the “most viable” option for the BJP.
“We have been saying for long that a one-to-one fight formula is needed to defeat the BJP. In Karnataka, the public defeated the party by giving a fight to the BJP. TMC is the only force fighting against BJP in West Bengal.
Abhishek also quipped on behalf of his party that people have rejected the “crisis-engine” government of the saffron camp. “It is a victory for the people of that state. This is the defeat of the top leadership of BJP.
Ongoing rivalry between Congress and TMC The latter party’s spokesperson Kunal Ghosh told reporters that the Congress may have won Karnataka, but its role in Bengal remained questionable “as it allied with the Left to oppose the TMC”. And in return, help the BJP”.
There was an atmosphere of celebration in the Congress camp in Bengal.
Hundreds of Congress workers waving party flags gathered at Vidhan Bhawan, the state party headquarters in the city, as soon as the results of the May 10 election were announced.
They hug each other, apply ‘gulal’, beat drums while furious supporters celebrate Congress’ landslide victory in the southern state by chanting ‘Rahul Gandhi Zindabad’, ‘Sonia Gandhi Zindabad’ and ‘BJP Door Hato’ . The only southern state to vote saffron in recent years.
Similar scenes were witnessed at Berhampur in Murshidabad, Purulia, Malda and other places in the state.
“It is a historic victory,” Adhir Chowdhary said, adding that the vote was against the ‘tanashahi’ (dictatorship) of the BJP. The political base of Chowdhury and the Congress has been shrinking since Mamata Banerjee came to power in the state in 2011 and is currently confined to a few pockets in north Bengal. It was also seen weakening in the Congress leader’s home district of Murshidabad in the last assembly elections.
Nevertheless, he claimed, “The Trinamool has nothing to feel proud of… It too will be rejected by the people of West Bengal in course of time.”
(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed)