Intro: Googly from BJP Chief Amit Shah Challenged Mamata on Home Turf
The people of Kolkata have been, by and large, all through supporter of nationalism represented by the then Jana Sangha and today’s Bharatiya Janata Party. But the organizational weaknesses have compelled this party to take back seat in the state especially after the death of Dr Syama Prasad Mookerji, its founder. There was only one breakthrough in recent times when the former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee left the newly formed NDA government after just thirteen days for want of clear majority and decided to seek support from the people for clear mandate. In that process, he came to Kolkata and the spontaneous support he got not only from the senior people of the city but the enthusiastic presence of youths is worth remembering as the BJP rally of November 30, 2014, under the leadership of Amit Shah, the BJP president, has been still more significant as the challenge is very crucial.
All the newspapers in Kolkata have given this news on the front page. Although the congregation was huge, but police said that the number of people attended the meeting was only 50 thousand. Whereas at the same venue with the same stretch of space, the TMC had organized its annual meeting on the July 21, 2014, and police said that it had a congregation of 5 lakh people. The newspapers have left this guesswork to their readers. BJP’s meeting organized on the same venue. But the government under the instruction from the ruling party Supremo refused to give permission to the BJP. The Congress, CPM, and other parties who wanted to hold meeting at the same venue have been bluntly refused. They did not pursue BJP did not leave the case. They pursued the matter upto the last and ultimately the Calcutta High Court gave the permission to BJP for holding the meeting to be addressed by its president Amit shah. It has been a tremendous victory because Mamata didi has started thinking that she is the only “MAN” in the state. Unfortunately for her, BJP has totally demolished and destroyed her ego. And the shock was so severe that after the meeting of BJP till date she did not utter a single word about the meeting let alone abusing the leaders of BJP.
The Telegraph of Kolkata in its reporting of the meeting on the front page wrote: The MAN Mamata Banerjee dismissed as “who is he?” Introduced himself today from a launch pad she herself had built “I am Amit Shah.”
“Mein Amit Shah hoon—Mein Bharatiya Janata Party ka ek chhota karyakarta hoon. Aur Mein aapko bataana chahta hoon ki Bangal se Trinamool ko ukhar ne ke liye aaya hoon (I am Amit shah—I am a small BJP worker I want to tell you that I have come to uproot Trinamool from Bengal,” the BJP national president told a rally in front of Victoria House.
Although Mamata herself did not utter anything about the rally, but she had deputed number of ministers to counter and even abuse the leaders of BJP. She had instigated Siddiqulla of Jamiat ul Ulema e Hind to organize a meeting near the venue of the BJP rally one day ahead of the BJP rally. From the podium of that rally many speakers vomited venom against the opposite leaders. On the one hand some speakers were speaking in terms of Indianness , claiming that they are also sons of the same soil—they are Indians. So they appealed not to be for terrorist activities of other people of their community. On the other hand, on the other hand there were at least eleven clashes near their meeting place. It was for the good sense of the other people that it did not escalate.
Even during the rally when Amit Shah was delivering his speech, all of sudden, from the nearby Tipu Sultan Mosque, AZAAN was started at 3.20 pm for a spell of few minutes. Amit Shah has stopped his speech for a while and resumed his speech. When people have noticed the same Tipu Sultan Mosque was decorated with a large Lotus and huge number of Muslim brethren joined the rally, the tension was subsided.
After the BJP rally on 30th November, the awe-stricken CPM has deployed its cadres to make a thorough survey of the people who had attended the BJP rally. They want specific information about how many people of a particular district attended the BJP rally, what are their racial status, what religion they belonged to etc. CPM had given a call for holding a big rally in Kolkata for which each member should bring at least two along with them. They are so scared that even then they are not sure to fulfill their target.
The Congress is also very active to infuse new life in the organization. The former WBPCC president Dr Manas Bhuniya said, “Now a days, Congress leaders prefer staying back at home and enjoying TV programmes to going for field working. If this life style is perpetuated for indefinite period no power on earth could be successful in rejuvenating the organization.
BJP’s Bengal Minder Siddhartha Nath Singh said, Mamata Banerjee came to power riding 3 Ms. Moa, Maati & manes. But 3 Ms meaning got changed to Madan, Mukul, Mamata. The 3 M has become BMB in 2014 which means bhag Madan bhag. # in 2015, it will become bhag Mukul bhag * In 2016,bhag—(Singh pauses, waiting for the audience to respond) They thundered, bhag Mamata bhag.
Asim Kumar Mitra (The writer is a senior journalist)
