The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will observe July 21 as ‘Murder of Democracy Day’ in West Bengal to protest against the alleged atrocities of the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC), party legislator and leader of the Opposition (LOP) in the state legislative assembly Suvendu Adhikari said on Sunday. The proposed agitation will coincide with the TMC’s annual ‘Martyrs’ Day’ rally.
“We will observe July 21 as ‘Murder of Democracy Day’. We will burn an effigy of West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee and Kolkata’s mayor Firhad Hakim on July 21,” Adhikari said while speaking to reporters outside the Raj Bhavan.
Adhikari staged a sit-in outside the Raj Bhavan in Kolkata with 300 alleged victims of post-poll violence and said that very soon he would line up 100 people, who couldn’t cast their votes in the recently held assembly byelections, outside the Raj Bhavan.
“Very soon I will gather 100 people who couldn’t cast their votes (in the recently held assembly bypolls) and line them up outside the gates of Raj Bhavan. It would be a symbolic protest. I will launch a portal where people who were not allowed to cast their votes may register their names. I am planning for a bigger movement,” he told media persons outside Raj Bhavan.
Earlier in June, a political row erupted after the Kolkata Police allegedly stopped Adhikari from staging a protest outside Raj Bhavan. Later the Calcutta high court permitted the BJP to hold a sit-in outside Raj Bhavan on July 14.
“Starting from July 19, the LoP and the BJP legislators will visit the houses of those who couldn’t cast their votes or were attacked in the recently held bypolls,” he said while adding that the party may also hold a march to the state secretariat.
The ruling-Trinamool Congress wrested all four assembly seats – Ranaghat Dakshin, Bagda, Raiganj and Maniktala – where bypolls were held on July 10. Except for Maniktala, which has been a TMC stronghold for long, the BJP had won all three in the 2021 assembly polls. The BJP MLAs, however, later sided with the TMC.
Responding to the allegations, senior TMC leader Kunal Ghosh said repeated rejections of BJP by the people of West Bengal in every election have led to despair among leaders like Adhikari who had previously made tall claims about getting a high number of seats in the Lok Sabha and assembly polls.
“It is pathetic how the BJP is showing disrespect to the sentiment of the families of the victims and opposition workers who braved the atrocities and terror by CPI(M) in those days. By choosing July 21 as the day of protest, leaders like Adhikari are showing the bankruptcy of their thinking,” Kunal Ghosh, TMC leader, told media.