Kolkata:
The Congress-Trinamool fight just got uglier. After snapping ties with the Congress in West Bengal, Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee seems determined to rub the Congress the wrong way in Delhi.
On Wednesday, she virtually accused the Congress of being an unreliable ally which had even formed a government with the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPM) in the past. All this, even as she lured state Congress working president Subrata Mukherjee into the Trinamool fold, signaling a coup ahead of the civic polls in Bengal on May 30.
Subrata joined the Trinamool for the second time, accusing Congress of conspiring with CPM to break the Congress-Trinamool alliance in the state. Mamata, in turn, subtly turned a cold shoulder towards the Congress in Delhi.
She cited Siliguri where, in civic polls last September, Congress dumped Trinamool and took CPM support to elect a Congress Mayor.
"The Delhi government is not a one-party government, it's a coalition government, an alliance government, and we are a part and parcel of this UPA alliance. We keep our commitments and accordingly we had thought we would fight together. But the Siliguri polls opened our eyes and hurt us," Mamata said.
But Congress refuses these allegations, saying Siliguri is an exception.
"From one seat, she became 19 MPs. But we had six MPs, and we are still six MPs. We sacrificed everything. We wanted to defeat CPM in a combined fight between Congress and Trinamool Congress against CPM. It is very unfortunate it did not take shape properly," said Congress leader Manash Bhuiyan.
A Congress-Trinamool face off in Bengal is one thing. But it doesn't bode well for the UPA if the Bengal face-off begins to reverberate in Delhi as well.