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Congress still hopeful of a tie-up with Trinamool

KOLKATA: The Congress is still “hopeful” of an alliance with the Trinamool Congress for the upcoming West Bengal Assembly elections in 2011 but the latter would do well to stop calling the party “insulting names like an agent or the B-team of the Communist Party of India (Marxist)” and instead concentrate on fighting the Left Front, said Congress Legislature Party leader Manas Bhunia here on Monday.

The seat-sharing arrangement between the two parties for the forthcoming Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) polls has fallen through with Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee saying on Sunday that there was no alliance between the two parties in West Bengal.

She had also held the Congress, which is “providing oxygen to a dying CPI (M)”, responsible for the break-up of the electoral alliance for the civic polls.

“The West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee was always earnest about the alliance but unfortunately it did not materialise. Our demand for 51 seats (out of 141) could not be more reasonable and logical...Though we had expected a breakthrough from the meetings held in New Delhi that too failed. The Congress has not broken the alliance. An unprecedented situation was created to force the party into taking the decision,” said Mr. Bhunia.

Referring to Ms. Banerjee's allegations, Mr. Bhunia said: “It was with the Congress' support that the Trinamool Congress could win 20 seats in the Lok Sabha elections in 2009. But how justified and ethical it is of the Trinamool Congress to blame the Congress like this?”

He, however, sounded optimistic as he said that the Congress “still stands by its promise”. “We reiterate that the alliance was and will be there. It is a local election where the Trinamool Congress has decided to drift away. But we are determined to defeat the Left Front in the 2011 Assembly elections together as people want it,” Mr. Bhunia said.

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