Mamata pushes for parivartan in Delhi

Apart from her usual attack on Left Front's 34 years "misrule", Banerjee's speech was mostly dealt with TMC's poll strategy

Trinamool Congress (TMC) chief Mamata Banerjee on Thursday said her party would fight alone in the coming general elections and emerge as a major player nationally.

Launching the TMC’s Lok Sabha campaign from a massive rally at Brigade Ground here, she said her party was the alternative to “dynastic and corrupt” Congress and “rioter” Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Communist Party of India (Marxist). She positioned herself as a prime ministerial candidate and renewed the call for Federal Front.

Noted Bengali litterateur Mahasweta Devi set the tone at the rally, attended by about 500,000 people, by saying she wanted to see Banerjee as the next prime minister.

Addressing the gathering, an elated Banerjee said, “I had given a call for parivartan (change) in Bengal;  you had responded. Now, I want a parivartan in Delhi. You have to fulfil what Mahasweta Devi just said. There are only a few days left. Parivartan will come to Delhi. End the corruption, end the dynastic rule. Our fight is against the Congress, the BJP and the CPM. The BJP is no alternative to the Congress. TMC is the alternative. We need to talk to our friends in other states. We need to get together and form a Federal Front.”

On the party’s election strategy, she said, “We have to target all 42 seats. We can win them all. We will contest in other states as well. I’ll campaign outside West Bengal.”

The TMC chief asked party representatives from Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh to step up the work.

Apart from her usual attack on the Left Front's 34 years “misrule”,  Banerjee's speech was mostly dealt with TMC's poll strategy and her direction to her workers and supporters. “All of you should secure support of at least 10 people to bring about parivartan in Delhi,” she said.

Although she spent most of the time criticising Congress, she did not spare even BJP's PM candidate Narendra Modi.

“We don't want a face that is a symbol of riots,” she said without naming Modi. The remark is likely to upset BJP, which has been trying to woo the TMC. Modi had publicly praised Mamara's effort to revive Bengal.

Modi also will be addressing a rally, his first one in West Bengal, from the same venue on February 5, which would be followed by CPM’s on February 9. It would be interesting to see what they would say about Banerjee’s just-revealed aspiration of leading the country.