CM Mamata's 'outsider voters' remark a fear of losing Bengal polls: BJP

Kolkata, Oct 18 (IANS) The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) said on Saturday, while responding to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's allegations, that the former was trying to reside outsiders in her native Assembly constituency of Bhabanipur of Kolkata is nothing but fear of facing defeat from the constituency during the upcoming Assembly polls scheduled to be held next year.

"A particular political party tries to bring outsiders before any election and try to get them enrolled as voters before any election. Some of them stay in guest houses and hotels. The richer ones purchase flats. But none of them are residents of that locality. How can the same person have names in the voters' lists at two different places?" the Chief Minister said on Friday after inaugurating a community Kali Puja pandal in Kolkata.

BJP's IT Cell Chief and the party's central observer for West Bengal, Amit Malviya, has released an X post ridiculing Chief Minister Banerjee for her comments that people are buying flats in Bhabanipur just to become a voter from her constituency.

"West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee seems to have completely lost the plot. Her claim that people are buying flats in Bhabanipur just to get a vote and defeat her is bizarre. Clearly, the Nandigram loss still haunts her. More importantly, it's an admission that people in Kolkata are so fed up with her that they would go to any extent to see her gone. The writing is on the wall -- this doesn't look good for her," Malviya said.

Recently, the Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in Assembly and senior BJP leader, Suvendu Adhikari, had repeatedly claimed that Chief Minister Banerjee will be defeated from Bhabanipur in the 2026 West Bengal Assembly polls.

"I defeated her (Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee) from Nandigram during 2021 state Assembly polls. Next year, she will be defeated from Bhabanipur. She will be defeated even in her own ward," LoP Adhikari claimed.

Chief Minister Banerjee contested the 2021 West Bengal Assembly polls from the Nandigram constituency in East Midnapore district and was defeated by LoP Adhikari.

Later, Mamata Banerjee contested the bypolls from Bhabanipur and was elected as the the Chief Minister for the third consecutive term.

Incidentally, Bhabanipur is one of the seven Assembly constituencies under the Kolkata (Dakshin) Lok Sabha constituency.

During the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, although the Trinamool Congress candidate Mala Roy got elected for the second time from Kolkata (Dakshin), she trailed in the majority of municipal corporation wards in both Bhabanipur and its adjacent Rashbehari constituency.

Chief Minister Banerjee travelled from Ward Number 73 of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation where she herself is a voter.

--IANS

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