Lok Sabha Elections 2024: Senior Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader Abhishek Banerjee has issued a challenge to Union Home Minister Amit Shah, daring him to contest against him from the Diamond Harbour Lok Sabha constituency. In a bold declaration, Banerjee stated that if the BJP leader emerged victorious, he would retire from active politics.
Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's nephew Abhishek will lock horns with BJP candidate Abhijit Das on June 1 in the seventh phase of the Lok Sabha elections.
'I will leave politics forever'
Banerjee, who is seen as the second-in-command within the TMC, also asserted that Shah has two alternative paths to prompt his retirement from politics.
Addressing an election rally for TMC's Mathurapur candidate Bapi Halder on Tuesday, Banerjee said, "If you want Abhishek Banerjee to leave active politics, then I would like you to fulfil any of the three options I am providing you today. You release the state's dues of ₹ 1,64,000 crore and I will retire within 24 hours. The second option is to release the funds of the PM Awas Yojana."
"The nomination for the Diamond Harbour constituency is yet to start. The third option: you (Mr Shah) contest from here and defeat me. I will leave politics forever," the party's national general secretary said.
Notably, Amit Shah is the Lok Sabha MP from the Gandhinagar seat in Gujarat.
Banerjee's befitting reply to Shah
In response to the BJP leader's claim that TMC chief Mamata Banerjee desired him to be the next chief minister of West Bengal, Abhishek Banerjee remarked that everyone is not like him (Shah). “You wish to make your son the BCCI president. Not all are like you. You have never been part of any agitation. You are a person who was jailed. We do not need to learn any moral values and ideology from you,” Banerjee said.
The son of the Union Home Minister, Jay Shah, is the Secretary of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).
"You are in politics for your benefit. We do not do that. We are in politics to address the cause of the people," he said. Banerjee described BJP leaders as "outsiders" and "migratory birds," urging people not to vote for them.
Banerjee also slammed Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, who campaigned in West Bengal, labelling him as the "biggest failure as the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh." "It was under his rule that brutal incidents such as Unnao, Hathras and Lakhimpur Kheri took place. Five farmers were mowed down by the son of Union minister Ajay Teni Mishra under Yogi Adityanath's government. We don't need to learn law and order from him," he said.
Without elaborating, Banerjee asked the voters to wait for seven days after which they “will see how BJP has tried to malign Bengal in front of the entire country for their vested interest.”
Diamond Harbour Lok Sabha constituency
Diamond Harbour is one of the Lok Sabha constituencies in West Bengal. The state has 42 parliamentary seats. The Diamond Harbour seat comprises seven Assembly segments including Diamond Harbour, Falta, Satgachia, Bishnupur, Maheshtala, Budgebudge and Metiaburuz. The constituency is a general seat. The TMC and the BJP are the main parties in the constituency.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha Elections, Abhishek Banerjee from TMC won the seat with a margin of 320,594 votes. Abhishek Banerjee was polled 791,127 votes with a vote share of 56.00 per cent and defeated Nilanjan Roy from BJP who got 470,533 votes (33.39 per cent). Similarly, in the 2014 Lok Sabha Elections, Abhishek Banerjee from TMC won the seat and was polled 508,481 votes with a vote share of 40.3 1per cent. CPM candidate Dr Abul Hasnat got 437,183 votes (34.66 per cent) and was the runner-up. Abhishek Banerjee defeated Dr Abul Hasnat by a margin of 71,298 votes.
(With PTI inputs)
