‘Communists came to power in Tripura due to support from Congress’: Biplab Deb
Biplab Kumar Deb said that the Barmans had openly aligned with the CPI(M) and claimed that Tripura Congress president Ashish Kumar Saha has got a Communist gene
The Communists would never have got a chance to come to power in Tripura if the Congress had not given support to them, and people of the state will give a befitting reply to them in a democratic manner in the upcoming general elections, said former Tripura chief minister and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s nominee for the West Lok Sabha constituency, Biplab Kumar Deb.
Addressing a poll campaign at Nalchar in Sepahijala district on Sunday, Deb said that former chief minister and veteran Congress leader Samir Ranjan Barman and his son Sudip Roy Barman (MLA and Congress Working Committee member) had openly aligned with the Communist Party of India (Marxist), or CPI(M), and claimed that the incumbent Congress state president Ashish Kumar Saha has got a Communist gene.
“The Communists would never have got the chance to assume power in Tripura if the Burmans had not given support to them. They did this for their own personal interest. Their behind-the-scenes affinity with the Communists is clear to all people now. Even Congress president Ashish Kumar Saha also acquired the Communist gene. The people will give a reply to it in a democratic manner in the Lok Sabha polls,” Deb said.
Saha is also Deb’s opponent in the coming Lok Sabha polls. Sudip Roy Barman started his political career with the Congress and later moved to the Trinamool Congress (TMC) in 2016 along with five other MLAs and later to the saffron party in 2017, a year before the BJP forming government in Tripura for the first time. He became the health minister in the first term of the BJP government led by Biplab Kumar Deb, but a year later, he was sacked for his alleged indifferences with Deb. He, later, returned to the Congress ahead of the 2023 state Assembly polls.
Deb further alleged that CPI(M) state secretary Jitendra Chaudhury became a legislator and later got the status of Opposition leader due to TIPRA Motha party. Chaudhury got the Opposition leader status after the TIPRA Motha, the major opposition party, joined the government last month.
Deb also blamed the CPI(M) for “playing dirty politics” by targeting TIPRA Motha party founder Pradyot Kishore Debbarma and his family. “They [CPI(M) leaders] claimed our candidate of East Tripura seat, Kriti Singh Debbarma, [Pradyot’s sister] as an outsider, where as, their party and ideology came from China. In the last 25 years, they failed to upgrade socio-economic condition of the people in the state. Their agenda was to keep people under deprivation and to develop their party and party office,” said Deb.
He also criticised the CPI(M) for illegal recruitment of 10,323 teachers and political violence that led to loss of several lives and left many homeless.
He urged people to utilise their voting rights wisely and break all records of the previous polls.
He said that during the 10-year rule of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, different pro-welfare schemes have reached till the last person and accused the Opposition of misleadin the voters.
No immediate reaction from available from the Congress, CPI(M) or the TIPRA Motha.
The two Lok Sabha seats of the state, West and East constituencies, would go for polls on April 19 and 26, respectively.
