Mamata couldn't have become CM without BJP's help: Sovan Chatterjee
Kolkata: Once a right-hand man and a close aide of West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, ex-Kolkata Mayor Sovan Chatterjee on Tuesday said his former party chief couldn't have assumed power without the saffron party's assistance.
Sovan switched from the Trinamool Congress to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) last week.
Reminding the tie up between the Trinamool and the BJP in 1998, Chatterjee said, "In 1998, if the BJP wouldn't have supported the Trinamool, it could not have achieved this success and Mamata Banerjee could not have become the Chief Minister."
"We have seen the political violence of the CPI-M for 34 years and within eight years after coming to power, the Trinamool is doing much more than the Left regime," he said at the party's state headquarters.
Chatterjee, who had served as the Kolkata Mayor between 2010 and 2018, also said he was not getting due respect from the Trinamool.
"I had lost path in the Trinamool and then I met BJP state president Dilip Ghosh who urged me to work for the saffron party. I was overwhelmed by the warmth given to me by Ghosh" said the MLA from Behala Purba who is also an accused in the Narada sting operation where he was seen accepting money.
Narada was the main issue which was raised by the BJP against the Trinamool in 2016 Assembly Elections and the sting footage was shown by Jay Prakash Majumder who was sitting along with Chatterjee on Tuesday.
Chatterjee had resigned from the Mayor's post last year after Mamata had rebuked him for presenting a wrong fact in the Legislative Assembly in response to a question raised by an Opposition member.
However, the veteran politician is yet to resign as the councillor and MLA, the posts which he had won in Trinamool's ticket.
Reflecting on the massive inroad of the BJP in the 2019 General Elections in West Bengal, Chatterjee, who was sitting along with her friend and party colleague Baishakhi Banerjee, was sure of the political outfit's success in the 2021 Assembly Elections.
Accusing the West Bengal's ruling party of resorting to wrong doings, Chatterjee said, "Even after the violence, the BJP won 18 seats in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. If the elections were fair, then the BJP would have brought a big change in the state. It is clear that the BJP is winning the upcoming Assembly Elections."
(Images by Soumo Das/IBNS)
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