BJP bides time to launch attack

KOLKATA: On November 30, his BMB statement — 2014 Bhaag Madan Bhaag. 2015 Bhaag Mukul Bhaag. 2016 Bhaag Mamata Bhaag — had riled the rank and file of Trinamool Congress. It seems BJP national secretary Sidharth Nath Singh’s ‘prediction’ has turned ominous for Madan Mitra, whose counter-take — 2019 will be Bhaag Modi Bhaag — is still a long five years away. Singh, however, stresses he is no astrologer.“But the way things are panning out, I may soon become one,” Singh said from his Allahabad home.
For the state BJP, of which Singh is in charge, it was a rather quiet day. A one-line statement issued by state BJP president Rahul Sinha to counter chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s no-holds-barred attack on his party — and its leadership — on any other day would have evoked a more stringing and elaborate riposte. But the state BJP is evidently biding its time. It’s keen not to step into any provocation. According to sources, with Trinamool Congress bent on making this an issue in Parliament on Monday, the state BJP would choose to wait the response it evokes from its leadership in New Delhi. Singh, however, says none of it. “I have been travelling myself. I haven’t been able to keep track of the day’s developments,” he says.
“It think its sheer desperation that is making her to say things that she is saying against us now,” Singh said, reacting to Mamata’s outburts. “People can’t be taken for granted. Mamata Banerjee had all the time in the world to probe the Saradha chit-fund scam. Did her police try to unearth the truth? In fact, I would say that she has tried to shield real culprits. And now the allegations are right at her doorstep.” Singh says.
The BJP-led Centre didn’t order a CBI probe, he clarified. “The Supreme Court had ordered the CBI probe. And if you remember, the allegations against her partymen were made by her own MP Kunal Ghosh, not BJP. The man (read Sudipta Sen) who bought her paintings at MF Hussain painting’s value had made these allegations. Why didn’t she act? What stopped her from doing in spite the fact that 1.7 million poor people are involved. Let her answer these questions first and then attack us.”