Adityanath calls for Mamata's ouster, says BJP to ensure women's safety in Bengal

Calling upon people to oust the Mamata Banerjee government, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath said on Saturday that the BJP, if voted to power in Bengal, will ensure security for all women and create job opportunities for the youth.

Adityanath, who addressed two rallies during the day, also said that those who had tried to stop Durga Puja and Saraswati puja will be put behind bars if the saffron party forms government in Bengal.

''You had given 50 years to the Congress, 30 years to the communists and 10 years to the Trinamool Congress, I urge you to give five years to the BJP... We will change the face of West Bengal.

''The BJP will stop all tortures perpetrated on the women of West Bengal. It will ensure that youths get employment opportunities,'' the Uttar Pradesh CM said at a public meeting in the Falta area of South-24 Parganas district.

Raising anti-TMC slogans such as ''Doo Maaye (May), Didi gaaye'', (May 2, Didi gone), the senior BJP leader also said that his party will guarantee ration for everyone, provide pension to the old, houses to the poor, while also making sure that the people of the state get to avail the benefits doled out under PM-Kisan Samman Nidhi and Ayushman Bharat health scheme.

''No one will be allowed to play with the emotions of people. We will see to it that Durga Puja and Saraswati Puja are held in Bengal without any hindrance. Jail doors are open for the ones who wish to stop such religious festivals,'' Adityanath asserted.

Controversy had erupted in 2017 at a school in Tehatta, Nadia district, over the celebration of Saraswati puja, with a section of students apparently trying to stop another group from observing the festival.

In that very year, the West Bengal government had imposed curbs on Durga idol immersion, as the occasion coincided with Muharram, but the high court later eased the restrictions.

Adityanath further said that properties of goons, who threaten people to have their way, will be confiscated, and they would be made to beg on the streets.

''In the past, the situation was somewhat similar in UP. Now, where are those people (goons)? None will be able to find a single one of them,'' he said.

Speaking at another rally in Kultuli, the UP CM, listing the benefits available to the people of his state, sought to know why government employees in West Bengal were not getting salaries in accordance with the Seventh Pay Commission.

''Why hasn't Didi implemented central schemes here? It's for her that the people of Bengal have been deprived of the doles offered by the central government. What has Didi done for the people of the state other than pursuing appeasement politics? The TMC supremo has just one agenda promoting her nephew Abhishek Banerjee,'' he alleged.

Earlier in the day, Adityanath held roadshows in Howrah district's Uluberia to bolster the BJP's campaign in West Bengal, ahead of the third phase of assembly elections.

Standing atop a vehicle, decked up with flowers and BJP flags, he waved at the enthusiastic crowd that gathered along the road in the Gangarampur area of the subdivision where two constituencies -- Uluberia Uttar and Uluberia Dakshin -- will go to polls on April 6.

Locals had queued up on both sides of the road and watched the procession, which inched its way through the narrow streets amid chants of 'Jai Shri Ram.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)