New Delhi: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee initiative for the opposition in the 2019 elections to start a united front against the BJP is set to face the first challenge and that too at the home turf. Ms Banerjee appeared to have lost her temper with the Congress and the Left parties that have recently joined the BJP to accuse Trinamool cadres of violence ahead of panchayat elections.

“We want one to one fight against BJP, because it is a communal party. We believe in that. CPI-M and the Congress also say the same thing. But in Bengal, they are together. They are three brothers here. Does that mean they (Congress and CPI-M) don’t consider BJP in Bengal as communal? They should clarify?” Ms Banerjee told reporters as she walked out of her office, seething.

“Congress, rather than fighting (Narendra) Modi and Amit Shah, tied up with the BJP here. They should first answer people how they have joined forces with the BJP overnight here,” the Trinamool Congress president said while she was complaining that the Congress appeared to be on the same side as the BJP in Bengal. “Outside Bengal, they are fighting the BJP. How come is that possible?”

She had spent several days in Delhi last month to render support from the opposition leaders to discuss the opposition strategy to stop the BJP’s march in the 2019 general elections.

After the successful tie-up between Mayawati-Akhilesh Yadav in Uttar Pradesh, she suggested that if the opposition were ready to support a single candidate in a seat, the BJP did not even get a single chance. Mr Banerjee had already made this suggestion to the Congress to and the reports suggests that Mrs Sonia Gandhi was also open to the idea.

The Congress president, Rahul Gandhi too appeared to support this strategy and had recently told news reporters that there was no way Prime Minister Modi can return to power if opposition parties take a united stance.

Mr Banerjee had put up hopes about this understanding that it would ensure that the two opposition parties do not unite with the BJP, specially when it was leading a sustained and a misleading campaign that claims about the people were not able to file their nomination.

She said that the opposition has put up 90,000 candidates for the total 58,000 – odd panchayat seats.

“The opposition could not file nominations in some seats because they lack people, lack a tight organisation. Moreover, many seats have been reserved for Scheduled castes, tribes and Other Backward Classes. It is difficult to find the right candidates for these seats,” she said at the state secretariat Nabanna.

The Trinamool Congress, back in 2003, had contested only 30,000 of the total 58,000 seats. In 2008, her own party put up only 35,000 candidates, she said, to make the point that the number of nominations was not as low as it was shown.

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