Kolkata: It is a known fact that West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee rose to power after several struggles and protests against the erstwhile Left Front government.
After fighting over several issues by the Left Front government, which according to her was not in favor of common people, Mamata ousted 34 years of the Left regime and came to power in 2011.
CPI (M) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) feel that the common people are now ‘aware’ that whatever she had promised before coming to power, she is doing exactly ‘opposite’ now.
Referring to Tuesday’s Nabanna Abhiyaan, senior CPI (M) leader and politburo member Sujan Chakraborty mentioned that she is practicing ‘opposite’ of what she had earlier preached.
“People of the state are now understanding what she is doing. Before coming to power, she had called 73 strikes and now they (TMC) say they are against strikes,” said Chakraborty.
BJP spokesperson and Rajya Sabha MP Shamik Bhattacharya said, “Women are not safe in the state where the Chief Minister is also a woman. She should immediately resign. The common people got aware.”
However, political analyst Udayan Bandhopadhyay stated that Mamata Banerjee always protested over an ‘issue’.
“All the protests that Mamata Banerjee did had an issue. This Nabanna Abhiyaan became a partisan act and is issueless. We all are pained by the brutal incident that took place at RG Kar. Following which social movements started but protest at Nabanna with only chants of CM’s resignation is issueless,” added Bandhopadhyay.
Another poll analyst Shubhamoy Maitra said, “It is very clear that now the position of Mamata Banerjee amongst the liberal intellectual Bengali middle class is not as enviable as during 2006-2011. Unfortunately, the percentage of votes with this class is not large enough to have an effect in elections. Thus, it is to be seen whether the present efforts of hitting the streets can be compared with the 'street fighter' image and political success of Mamata Banerjee.”
