Yechury calls on secular, democratic forces to ensure BJP is defeated

Kolkata, May 24: The CPI(M) on Thursday (May 24) called upon all secular and democratic forces to dislodge the Narendra Modi-led BJP government in the 2019 Lok Sabha election.

"In West Bengal, 'Modi Hatao, Desh Bachao, (Defeat Modi, Save Country) and TMC Hatao, Bengal Bachao' will remain our stand," CPI(M)General Secretary Sitaram Yechury said in Kolkata on Thursday.

"When the elections will near "appropriate electoral tactics will be adopted with the objective of maximising pooling of anti-BJP votes," Yechury told a press meet.

"We will ask all secular, democratic forces to ensure the BJP government is defeated whenever the general election takes place," he said.

He said ousting the BJP from power in Delhi and TMC in Bengal was necessary "as their agendas overlap to a great extent". Hinting at the alleged nexus between the BJP and TMC, he said, "There are certain questions that remained unanswered like the RSS' claim to have reached 90 percent areas of the state and why the central government does not proceed with Sarada, Narada, Rose valley cases?"

Asked about sharing the stage with non-BJP leaders including Mamata Banerjee at H D Kumaraswamy's swearing-in ceremony in Bengaluru yesterday, Yechury said it was not his decision and he was there to honour an invite sent by the host.

"If you are in a rail compartment with someone also sitting there, you can't ask why that person is also there," the veteran leader said.

Asked about Banerjee's idea of a non-Congress federal front with regional parties to take on the BJP in the 2019 polls, Yechury said, "When election comes, all sorts of talks happen. In India, politics is dominated by regional forces in various places as you cannot have uniform structure. We fight people in different parts as they are our main adversary."

"All the formations and arrangements are made in a post-election scenario. But both TMC and BJP have to be fought and defeated as they are two sides of the same coin," he said. On Panchayat polls in Bengal where his party fared very poorly, Yechury said people resisted to the violence "unleashed by the ruling TMC".

Alleging that both TMC and BJP are playing politics of communalism, he said, "It is no longer competitive communalism, but competitive polarisation of people. This is dangerous for Bengal." On surging fuel prices in the country, Yechury demanded immediate lowering of excise duty to relieve the common man.

PTI