Mamata Banerjee, the Chief Minister of West Bengal, wrote to non Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) amid the ongoing West Bengal Assembly elections.
In a three-page letter to more than a dozen non-BJP leaders, Ms. Banerjee ask them to unite against the BJP. She accused the BJP of ‘attacking democracy and constitutional federalism in India.’
Mamata Banerjee said the Narendra Modi led BJP is trying to establish a “one-party authoritarian rule” in India. She said, all the non BJP parties should unite together against the BJP.
The three-page letter was sent on the 28th of March, was addressed to more than a dozen non-BJP leaders, including Congress president Sonia Gandhi, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar, Shiv sena supremo and Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) President and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Rashtriya Janata Dal’s (RJD) Tejashwi Yadav, Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) president M.K. Stalin, among others.
Banerjee accused the BJP and its government at the Centre of “attacking democracy and constitutional federalism in India,” citing the recently-passed Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (GNCTD) Bill as an example. “With this law, the Lieutenant Governor Delhi has been made the undeclared Viceroy of Delhi, acting as a proxy for the home minister and the prime minister. The government has snatched away practically all the powers of the democratically elected government of Delhi,” the Trinamool Congress (TMC) chief, known for her frequent face-offs with the BJP and the central government, wrote.
She cited six other instances to highlight her point: “Governors functioning as BJP office bearers, use of investigating agencies against opposition parties and governments, withholding transfer of funds to non-BJP states, disbanding of the National Development Council, Inter-state Council, Planning Commission; amassing of unlimited resources by the BJP to topple non-BJP governments, and the Central government’s reckless policies of privatisation of national assets.”
The Centre-state relations, and those between the ruling party at the Centre and the Opposition parties, have never been this bad in the history of India, Banerjee further wrote, remarking that the blame for this rests squarely with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “authoritarian conduct.”
“Therefore, I strongly believe that the time has come for a strong and effective struggle against the BJP’s attacks on democracy and Constitution, promising to work wholeheartedly with all similar-minded parties against the BJP.
