One time wonderboy, Prashant Kishor — the poll strategist who had shot to fame after working with Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his 2014 election campaign has switched flanks for the umpteenth time and sided with West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for the upcoming assembly elections. As usual, the entire electoral strategy of Mamata to garner votes, as devised by Kishor has revolved around disparaging PM Narendra Modi and BJP, rather than talking about the development work, if any, she has done in the past two tenures.
However, a battle-hardened PM Modi, in the blink of an eye has turned Kishor’s anti-Modi propaganda into an anti-TMC fireball. While addressing a humongous election rally in West Bengal’s Bankura, the PM said while referring to the poster where Mamata’s plastered leg was kept on the head of PM Modi, “Didi, if you want you can put your foot on my head and kick me but I will not let you kick Bengal’s development and dreams of its people.”
Blasting the West Bengal CM for making hollow promises in the last ten years, the PM asked where is the work that Mamata claimed to have done. “You keep saying ‘Khela Hobe’ while people of West Bengal have decided ‘Khela Shesh Hobe’,” PM Modi added.
The PM even took to Twitter to share the support of the people of Bankura when he went to address the election rally, suggesting that a change was imminent in the state, come May 2.
“The picture of Bankura today is witness that people of Bengal have decided on May 2, ‘didi jacche ashol poriborton ashche, ashol poriborton anche,” PM Narendra Modi said.
Thank you Bankura for the affection. Watch my speech at the rally. https://t.co/ltblZ18srN
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) March 21, 2021
If the modern election history of India is any evidence, it has shown that whenever a party has tried to downgrade or malign the opposition leader or candidate, it has always backfired. From being called ‘Maut ka Saudagaar’ by Congress to his government being called ‘Suit-buit ki sarkar’ by the entire opposition, PM Modi has coped much vicious vitriolic from the opposition and yet he has always emerged unscathed while those regurgitating such venom have faltered.
By playing on the pitch of Prashant Kishor, PM Modi has tugged to the hearts of the ordinary Bengalis by offering his head to a dictatorial Mamata. It now needs to be seen, how the former JDU leader comes up with any response to PM Modi’s masterstroke.