Mamata Banerjee, chief minister of West Bengal, has squarely blamed Congress for the BJP's return to power at the Centre for the third consecutive term in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, in her new book.
A total of three new books penned by the Chief Minister were released on the first day of the Kolkata International Book Fair on Tuesday afternoon and one of the three books titled 'Banglar Nirbachon o Amra (Bengal elections and us)', she has made an analysis of the results of the 2024 general elections.
According to her own observations in the book, despite best efforts on the part of the Trinamool Congress, the opposition INDIA bloc could not succeed electorally owing to a complete failure on the part of Congress.
"Severely wanted a strong opposition bloc against BJP at the national level combining all anti-BJP forces. Since the inception, we had insisted on a common minimum programme and common manifesto". The name of the opposition bloc too was my proposal.
The chair of the leader of the national bloc was offered to Congress. But despite all that, neither a common minimum programme nor a common manifesto was there.
The constituents of the bloc were contesting among themselves. It helped BJP gain power even though it did not win a majority, Chief Minister wrote in her book.
She has also claimed in the book that the number of seats that Congress had won in the last Lok Sabha elections was because of the backing of the other allies in the INDIA bloc.
On the West Bengal-specific election aspect, the Chief Minister had claimed that though in the state Congress had a seat-sharing arrangement with CPI(M)-led Left Front, in real terms, it was a bigger anti-Trinamool Congress arrangement with clandestine understanding with BJP.
According to her, the electoral success of the Trinamool Congress in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls was due to spontaneous public support inspired by the different developmental activities undertaken by her government.
Trinamool Congress bettered its count in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, going up from 22 to 29. In contrast, BJP's tally decreased to 12 from 18 in 2019. Congress managed to win one seat while CPI(M)-led Left Front ended with zero.
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