Mamata opposing NRC as Bangladeshis are TMC vote bank, says Amit Shah

Kolkata, August 11

BJP president Amit Shah on Saturday said West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee opposed the NRC in Assam due to “vote-bank politics” and called upon the people of the state to uproot the TMC government, saying it patronised infiltration from Bangladesh besides corruption.

He also asked Congress president Rahul Gandhi and Trinamool Congress (TMC) chief Banerjee to clarify their stand on infiltration from Bangladesh and the National Register of Citizens (NRC).

Addressing a well-attended public rally here, the BJP chief began his speech with the slogan of uprooting the TMC government from Bengal and said in order to do that, he would visit all the districts of the state.

“Why do you want to keep the Bangladeshi infiltrators?” Shah asked Banerjee, and said she was against the NRC for “vote-bank politics”.

He alleged that the Bangladeshi infiltrators were a vote-bank of the previous Communist government and now, they had become a vote-bank of the TMC.

“Rahul Gandhi and Mamata didi should clarify whether national security is important for them or the vote bank. For the BJP, the country comes first,” Shah said.

Earlier in the day, ahead of Shah’s rally in central Kolkata’s Mayo Road, a group of bike-borne Youth Congress workers waved black flags before Shah’s convoy outside the Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International airport and shouted slogans against him and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, before the police removed them from the spot.
Some Congress activists also claimed that there was a nexus between the BJP and West Bengal’s ruling Trinamool Congress and raised slogans like “Modi-Didi bhai bhai”.