Trinamool Congress’s General Secretary Abhishek Banerjee declared on Saturday that the party will withdraw all its candidates for the 42 Lok Sabha seats in West Bengal if the BJP can announce that the poor will be able to get cooking gas at zero cost for the next five years.
He made the statement while addressing a meeting held to discuss the upcoming Lok Sabha polls in Mathurapur.
“You don’t need to give Lakshmir Bhandar, didi is already giving that. What I am challenging you is to bring a notification and announce that cooking gas will be provided free of cost to people for the next five years,” said Banerjee.
The ‘Lakshmir Bhandar’ scheme was launched by the TMC government in West Bengal in February 2021 to provide financial help to women from economically weaker sections. In this year’s budget, the assistance for the general category was increased from Rs 500 to Rs 1,000 per month and for SC/ST it was raised from Rs 1,000 to Rs 1,200.
Abhishek Banerjee’s remark on the scheme was a jibe at BJP leaders Suvendu Adhikari and Sukanta Majumdar, who recently promised Rs 3,000 as a monthly allowance to every poor woman in the state if the party came to power.
Banerjee has been fielded from the Diamond Harbour Lok Sabha seat, but he said he would also take responsibility for the development of the adjacent constituency, Mathurapur.
“We have done everything that we had promised. I keep my promises. Mathurapur is adjacent to Diamond Harbour. I am taking the responsibility of Mathurapur’s development on my shoulders just like Diamond Harbour” said Banerjee.
Bapi Halder is the party’s candidate for the Mathurapur Lok Sabha seat.
The Trinamool Congress has fielded candidates for all 42 seats in West Bengal. Party supremo Mamata Banerjee had announced that the TMC would go solo in Bengal, causing a massive jolt to the INDIA bloc, and cited failed seat-sharing talks with the Congress as the reason.
Source Agencies
