Bengal should test more, Trinamool government appeasing Muslims: BJP

NEW DELHI: BJP has slammed the Mamata Banerjee-led government in West Bengal for not conducting ‘enough tests’ to identify Covid-19 patients. It cited the example of Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat, which recorded 400 out of total 1,008 deaths, to allude that Bengal was ‘not testing enough’ to keep under wraps the number of people infected by the pandemic. Incidentally, the same charge has been levelled against India by foreign agencies for having a relatively low number of reported cases and deaths.

In a letter to Banerjee which was released to the press on Wednesday, BJP general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya alleged she had been practising ‘vote-bank politics’ by ‘appeasement’, making it a ‘haven for illegal Bangladeshi immigrants’ and giving ‘unchecked powers to the Muslim community’ to conduct their affairs. “You keep saying that one has to bear if a milch cow kicks. It is because of your shameful appeasement politics that the Muslim community disdainfully violated the lockdown, throwing caution to the wind,” Vijayvargiya alleged. He referred to an incident in Tikiyapara, Howrah, on Tuesday were the Muslim community attacked the police which tried to disperse people from crowding a market. The attack caused “grievous and irreparable loss” to the morale of the department, he alleged.

The letter referred to the CM’s opposition to the inter-ministerial central team that visited the state and the steps taken to deal with the situation, the central government’s rations ‘not reaching’ the poor, the tussle between governor Jagdeep Dhankar and Banerjee and doctors and medics ‘not being provided’ personal protective equipment which endangered their lives. Two eminent doctors have succumbed to Covid-19 in the line of duty in Bengal.


“Is human death mere statistic to you? The day when you announced 18 deaths in West Bengal, you officers admitted in front of the ICMT sent by the central government that the real number was 57,” Vijayvargiya said in his letter. The official toll is 20 at the moment.

Bengal assembly polls are due in the first half of 2021.