Abhishek Banerjee holds Adhir responsible for 'failed' Cong-TMC understanding

Kolkata : Trinamool Congress national General Secretary and Lok Sabha MP Abhishek Banerjee on Monday held West Bengal Congress chief and five-time MP Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury for the failed alliance talks between the Congress and the Trinamool Congress in the state with regard to the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.

“There is a limit to anyone’s patience. Mamata Banerjee is constantly steering movements against the BJP. She has always been vocal against the Centre neglecting the people of West Bengal.

"But here she is being targeted by Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury. I want to ask him, how many times has he been vocal about Central negligence towards the people of West Bengal,” Abhishek Banerjee told newspersons on Monday.

He also accused the Congress leadership in general for not showing any interest about initiating seat-sharing talks with the Trinamool Congress in West Bengal.

“People will realise who is actually responsible for this. Mamata Banerjee has time and again insisted on concluding the dialogue process for seat-sharing by December 31 last year. But no one initiated this discussion. The opposition INDIA bloc is actually an alliance of the people. People will now decide whom to vote for,” he said.

Banerjee also made a statement, for the first time since the incident, on the attack on ED and CAPF officials at Sandeshkhali in North 24 Parganas district on January 5. According to him, what had happened at Sandeshkhali was unfortunate and should not have happened.

“I am not supporting anybody. The ED officials can go anywhere and conduct search operations at anyone’s place. But I want to ask just one question to the ED officials. They were there for three hours. The media came to know about that, but the local police did not,” Banerjee said.