Days after oppn meet, TMC, CPI(M), Congress trade charges in Bengal; Cong does not fear vendetta politics: Rahul tells its leaders from Left-ruled Kerala

Just days after they decided to be part of an anti-BJP alliance for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, the TMC, CPI(M) and Congress on Monday traded charges over state level political equations in West Bengal.

The Left-ruled Kerala, which will be another state where political equations will test the efforts to forge opposition unity, saw Congress leader Rahul Gandhi asserting that his party doesn’t fear the ''politics of intimidation and vendetta.'' He made the remarks after meeting the Congress' Kerala unit chief K Sudhakaran who was arrested recently in a cheating case.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee criticised the CPI(M) and Congress, saying despite her efforts to form a grand opposition alliance against the BJP at the Centre their actions of playing second fiddle to the saffron camp in the state are throwing a spanner in the works, and asserted she will break the ''unholy nexus''.

CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury on his part alleged that the Trinamool Congress(TMC) was complicit in violence in West Bengal and practising double standards by speaking for democracy to oust the BJP and denying the same in the state.

In signs that the road ahead could be tough for opposition unity efforts, the AAP-Congress rift over the Delhi ordinance issue has also escalated after senior Congress leader Ajay Maken alleged that Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's proclamations on opposition unity are not for cohesion but a ''calculated move to sabotage it to ''curry favour'' with the BJP.

Leaders of 17 opposition parties including the Congress, TMC, AAP and CPI(M) met in Patna Friday and resolved to forge an alliance to take on the BJP in the 2024 General Elections.

''We are trying to form a grand alliance (Mahajot) against the BJP at the Centre. But the CPI(M) and Congress are trying to work with the BJP in Bengal. I will break this unholy nexus in Bengal,” Chief Minister Banerjee, who is also the TMC supremo, said while addressing a panchayat election rally in Cooch Behar in West Bengal.

This is for the second time in the last ten days that Banerjee has criticised the Congress and CPI(M), accusing them of having a tacit understanding with the BJP in the state.

Reacting to Banerjee's claim, West Bengal Congress president Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said the ''credibility of the TMC in the fight against the BJP was always under a question mark.

''We all know the role that TMC had played in all these years in the fight against the BJP.'' Echoing Chowdhury's views, the CPI(M) said Banerjee should be the last person to lecture the Communists and the Congress on ways to fight against the BJP.

Meanwhile, the BJP rubbished the allegations of having any form of understanding with the CPI(M) and the Congress in the state.

Referring to the panchayat polls in West Bengal, Yechury alleged that it has become a norm that elections under the TMC will be marked by large-scale violence and terror. He said 10 people have already lost their lives including a young CPI(M) activist.

''They can't say they want democracy in India and therefore, oust the BJP, and then in Bengal ... you throttle democracy. That is not acceptable,'' he told a press conference at the end of a two-day Polit Bureau meeting in Delhi.

''Despite such politics of violence and terror, the people of West Bengal are resisting this murder of democracy and courageously coming forward to establish people’s panchayats.

''In the last panchayat elections, 34 per cent of the seats were uncontested due to unprecedented terror. In these elections, resisting such terror, the uncontested seats have drastically reduced by nearly two-thirds,'' Yechury said.

Opposition parties have alleged that their candidates were intimidated and assaulted to prevent them from filing nomination papers by people owing allegiance to the TMC at various places, but the ruling party has denied the charge.

An editorial in the Shiv Sena (UBT) mouthpiece 'Saamana', meanwhile, drew a parallel between Wagner mercenary group's ''revolt against Russian President Putin'' and the Patna meeting.

It claimed the ''Wagner group'' in India, a reference to opposition parties, will dislodge the Modi government through the ballot box by using the path of non-violence.

“Be it Modi or Putin, they have to face rebellion. The government in India will be dislodged by a non-violent Wagner and that route will be through the ballot box,” it claimed.

''Like Putin, Modi has to go, but in a democratic manner.'' “The Wagner group came together in Patna as a protector of democracy,” the Marathi daily said, referring to the conclave of the opposition parties in Bihar capital.