Biswabrata Goswami
HALDIA, 10 MARCH: Suvendu Adhikari, a BJP candidate from Nandigram today once again branded chief minister Mamata Banerjee as outsider. “She is an outsider in Nandigram. She does not even cast her vote here. I am not only the ‘Bhoomiputra’ (Son of soil in Nandigram) but also a regular voter here”, Suvendu, once close aide of Mamata Banerjee said in a rally held in Nandigram.
While addressing the rally, Suvendu said, “The chit fund scam happened because the TMC government and its leaders ‘looted public money’”.
He then asserted that if BJP is voted to power the people duped by the chit fund companies in the state would get back their money.
Slamming the chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s “I am a Hindu girl” comment, Suvendu said, “What the chief minister chanted the Hindu mantras (hymns) and Chandipath on the dias were all wrong. Her Chandipath was all mangled.”
On Tuesday, Mamata Banerjee had recited passages of “Chandi-path” or chants for Goddess Durga and declared: “You cannot teach me Hinduism. I have shown you that I know the mantras to Goddesses Lakshmi, Saraswati, Kali and Durga. It is not how you do it, memorising some lines before the election and dropping them at meetings.”
Mr Adhikari, on the other hand, came in the rally prepared with ammo.
He played a recording of the chants and then replayed Mamata Banerjee’s version.
Mr Adhikari rubbed it in by referring to Yogi Adityanath, the saffron-robed Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister who is among the BJP’s star campaigners in Bengal.
“Yogi can chant correct mantras, he should be brought here once to correct Mamata Banerjee’s chants. I want Yogi-ji to come here and do that,” he said.
He continued his attack on his former boss, accusing her of using “Hindu dharma” for politics.
“Now she has stopped saying inshallah. She took offence to Jai Shri Ram chanted during the Netaji birth centenary celebration. Yesterday she wore a shoe inside a temple…She is a Banerjee – why is she having to say she is Hindu?” – Mr Adhikari wondered.
