TMC doing ‘block vote’ politics before rural polls: BJP

Kolkata: Bengal BJP spokesperson Shamik Bhattacharya on Wednesday accused Trinamool of doing “block vote” politics ahead of the panchayat polls and the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. “Police are making selective arrests in a bid to reassure a particular community that the government is with them. The CM and Trinamool senior ministers have been cautioning against violence during Hanuman Jayanti in a bid to give a communal shape to a religious programme,” the BJP leader said on Wednesday.BJP national vice-president Dilip Ghosh said TMC was afraid of losing support of a particular community and was making statements against others to consolidate support of the other community.BJP leader and lawyer Priyanka Tibrewal drew the attention of the acting Chief Justice T S Sivagnanam to her experience at the Ram Navami rally in Howrah. “I was attacked as cops stayed spectators. They didn’t have any instruction to lathi-charge miscreants,” she said. “Random arrests are being made. They are beaten up. A youth has been arrested for carrying a pistol in the Ram Navami procession. But did he fire? But those who attacked processionists are not being touched.”BJP Hooghly MP Locket Chatterjee, addressing BJP workers in Chinsurah, said: “None of the persons who had a role in the violence have been arrested. Police are arresting those who were attacked on that day. We can understand that cops are helpless due to political pressure.”