The Trinamool Congress’ large appetite for targeting political opponents and indulging in brazen violence against them is well known. For a party, which only until two years ago was an unchallenged hegemon in the state of West Bengal to now become a divided camp whose leaders are abandoning it by the day, has evidently been hurtful for them. Expectedly, being a witness to mass-desertions is taking its toll on the top leadership of the TMC. However, one would expect that the incumbent party does not at the very least, physically attack its rebels who have jumped ship. Yet, that is what is precisely happening.
According to the Hindustan Times, Trinamool Congress party workers stopped the car of former party MP Sunil Mondal outside the BJP’s state headquarters in central Kolkata and staged a protest on Saturday morning. BJP MP Arun Singh alleged that TMC activists lay on the road in front of Sunil Mondal’s car. They also allegedly pelted stones at his car, displayed black flags and banged the windowpanes. Sunil Mondal, who quit the TMC recently to join the BJP was en route to attend a felicitation event for the newly inducted leaders.
A scuffle between BJP and TMC supporters was also reported owing to the unwarranted aggression of the latter. The police personnel on the ground failed to control the situation by themselves, necessitating additional police forces to be deployed in the area. Meanwhile, Union Home Minister Amit Shah has been briefed by West Bengal in-charge Kailash Vijayvargiya about the entire incident, in which MP Sunil Mondal was specifically targeted.
The TMC, to its flimsy defence, had MP Saugata Roy claim, “It was a spontaneous protest of the people of the area. Sunil has won the ticket twice from the TMC. He has betrayed our party. So, the TMC supporters stopped his car and staged a spontaneous protest. Nothing was planned.”The TMC has further asserted that they will bring in the anti-defection law against Sunil Mondal for not resigning as an MP.
The BJP has filed a complaint with the Hastings Police Station, with the party Vice President of Bengal Pratap Banerjee saying therewith, “It is very clear that this provocative act of the TMC is with the sole purpose of disturbing the peace of the area and creating a law-and-order situation.” The complaint also revealed how the TMC had set up a stage right in front of the saffron party’s Hastings office.
The party, in its complaint, added, “We call upon you to immediately take steps to have this stage removed, ensure that TMC do not hold any gathering of people and also deployment of appropriate deployment of force to maintain law and order.”
Earlier, a political heavyweight from West Bengal – Suvendu Adhikari, who recently joined the BJP along with 11 MLAs, Sunil Mondal and a former TMC MP had claimed that he has been “attacked” 11 times recently after it became clear that he was all set to quit the TMC. “I have been attacked 11 times recently. I want to tell my critics that I have people with me, and these people have come for the connection I have with them…I want to reiterate that all these attacks cannot deter me,” an India Today report quoted him as saying.
It thus becomes clear that the TMC is resorting to primitively violent methods to get back at its rebels and those who have deserted it before the all-important assembly elections early next year, sensing a magnanimous saffron surge in the state. The TMC is not going down as a party which lost a crucial election, upon which its survival hinges, with elegance. Instead, it is openly displaying its uncouth and rowdy behaviour, leaving the people of Bengal with no choice but to vote out the hooliganism.