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Monday, Feb 04, 2008
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“Congress dividing anti-Left vote”

Special Correspondent

KOLKATA: While criticising Chief Minister, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, for his government’s “authoritarian rule” and “for committing atrocities on the people of the State,” Trinamool Congress Chief Mamata Banerjee also directed her jibes at the Congress saying that the party “has set up home with the CPI (M) but claims to oppose it”

“All such dubious tactics [of the Congress] of ensuring there is no division in the anti-Left vote [in coming elections] is wrong and part of a conspiracy…The only real alternative to the Left Front is the Front led by the Trinamool Congress,” she said.

Ms. Banerjee was addressing a rally here on Sunday organised by the youth front of her party. It is the Congress, which by dividing the anti-Left vote, has been ensuring victory for the CPI(M), Ms. Banerjee said. The latter is aware that the Congress is a “trusted agent” to divide the votes against it, she added, ruling out the possibility of any electoral alliance with the Congress in the coming elections.

Panchayat elections

The panchayat elections are due in the State in May. “We made a mistake by forging an alliance with the Congress in the 2001 Assembly polls which we lost because of backstabbing by that party that had put up dummy candidates against us,” she said.

She came down strongly on the Left Front government “that was making beggars of the common man” against which her party would continue its struggle. The Chief Minister “is shameless” and is “misleading the people with false promises with an eye on the panchayat polls,” she said.

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