Bengal BJP to protest from home against state’s handling of COVID-19

-Kolkata, Apr 25: The BJP's West Bengal unit said its members and supporters would hold sit-in protest at their homes on Sunday over mismanagement by the state government in tackling coronavirus crisis, and alleged attacks on party workers by the ruling Trinamool Congress.

BJP state president Dilip Ghosh claimed that Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee was not performing her job properly, leading to a breakdown in administration, health services and in providing ration to the people of the state.

In order to divert attention from the pressing issues of effectively dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic, the chief minister was training her guns on the visiting Inter-Ministerial Central Team (IMCT) and Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar, Ghosh alleged.

"The BJP will hold a two-hour demonstration from 11 am with its workers and leaders holding sit-ins at their own homes on Sunday. It will be a silent protest," the BJP state president said.

He said party in-charge for the state Kailash Vijayvargiya will hold a sit-in at his home in Indore.

The silent protest would be held abiding by lock down rules and social distancing norms, the BJP MP said.

"With the whole system collapsing, she sought help from Prashant Kishore and had to bring him to the city aboard a cargo plane amid the lockdown to wriggle out of the situation," Ghosh told reporters.

It seems that Kishore is the only trusted person and she cannot depend on her own party's leaders or the administration, the BJP leader said.

The Bihar BJP on Thursday accused election strategist-turned-politician Prashant Kishor of travelling to Kolkata secretly in a cargo plane, dodging the lockdown, at the instance of his current benefactor - Mamata Banerjee.

Kishor, however, denied the charges.

Ghosh claimed that the Centre provided huge quantities of food grains to the state, but people are not getting adequate provisions from ration shops.

"People are dejected and this is leading to clashes with the police and to prevent these issues from coming up, our leaders are being stopped from going out of their homes," Ghosh said.

He claimed that while TMC leaders and ministers are working among the people, but leaders of other parties, especially those from BJP, were being prevented from stepping out of their homes to help the masses.

"Our MP from Balurghat constituency, Sukanta Majumdar has been sent a notice by the district police chief asking him to remain in-home quarantine, though he returned from Delhi on March 23 and stayed indoors for over 20 days," Ghosh said.

Ghosh also alleged that the saffron party's Purulia district women's cell chief was picked up by the police after she posted pictures of the condition at the local hospital there.