A day after West Bengal completed the second phase of its Assembly elections, chief minister Mamata Banerjee said the Trinamool Congress (TMC) would win at least 226 of the state’s 294 seats, while the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) countered the claim, saying her “game has ended.”
The TMC chief further alleged that the BJP pressured a section of the media to publish fictitious exit poll data showing its landslide victory so that share prices do not crash.
“We are forming the government of Ma, Mati and Manush (mother, land and people),” Banerjee said in a video message on Thursday, a day after the second and final phase of polling in 142 seats in Kolkata and six south Bengal districts, where the BJP won only 18 seats in 2021.
Of the 152 seats in 16 districts that went to polls in the first phase on April 23, the BJP won 59 in 2021. However, BJP leaders claimed that the record turnout of 93.19% in Phase 1 and 92.67% in Phase 2 pointed towards the TMC’s downfall.
In response, Banerjee alleged that the exit poll numbers were circulated from a BJP office while the second-phase election was under way.
“I know for sure that the exit poll numbers shown on television were circulated from a BJP office at 1.08 pm on Wednesday. A section of the media was pressured to publish it because our tally may reach 230 as well. We are surely crossing the 226 mark because people voted for us spontaneously,” Banerjee said.
“BJP played its last game using the media only to demoralise our workers and keep the share market steady. I have specific information regarding this. The market will crash if the truth is exposed. This was done after the 2021 and 2026 Assembly polls as well,” she added.
“I am grateful to all citizens of Bengal for standing in queue for hours to cast their votes and to our workers who faced the torture by the central (paramilitary) forces that beat up even women and small children. The Prime Minister, 16 chief ministers, the Centre’s machinery and forces tried to teach the people of Bengal a lesson. But their lesson is now locked inside the ballot box,” Banerjee further said in her video message.
BJP state unit president Samik Bhattacharya countered Banerjee, saying that “TMC’s departure is certain”. However, Bhattacharya did not predict how many seats his party might win.
“Her game has ended. People have passed their judgement. The TMC government is gone,” he said.
