Agartala: Election campaign gained momentum with the submission of nominations in West Tripura parliamentary constituency ahead of April 7 poll.
All the major political parties — ruling left front, opposition Congress and Trinamool Congress and BJP — have intensified door to door campaigning besides mass rallies at Assembly constituency level.
The ruling CPI(M), last bastion of Leftists, are confident of winning both the seats of the state with a comfortable margin, Chief Minister Manik Sarkar being the start campaigner for the left candidates.
According to party leaders, Sarkar has already addressed as many as 12 rallies in West Tripura and in next ten days he is scheduled to hold at least another 16 rallies covering all 30 assembly segments of the state.
While contemplating for third alternative government at the centre for a pro-people policies, he has been criticising both Congress-led UPA and BJP.
Hitting upon price rise of essential commodities, devaluation of rupee and inflation, Mr Sarkar persuaded non-Congress and non-BJP government at the Centre for saving the common Indians, farmers and unemployed youths.
Addressing a rally in his own Dhanpur assembly constituency, Mr Sarkar alleged, “India has witnessed a jobless unstable growth over a decade during Manmohan Singh’s regime to protect the interest of a few rich individuals and business group of India and America, which led the country into a deep trouble.”
Corruption of five lakh crore rupees during UPA II rule he blamed for the inflation and price rise adding, “After Independence, the country never faced such amount of corruption what could give a boost our education, health care and save the farmers as well as reduce the regional imbalance.”
He, however, pointed out that anti-people policies of Congress safe-guard the demands of monopolist, capitalist, landlord and corporate by reducing the basic requirement of poor Indians.
Criticizing BJP for communalism and corruption in NDA rule, he alleged that the BJP and Congress are two sides of a same coin. Pointing out the understanding between Congress and BJP he said all anti-people bills of UPA passed in Parliament with support of BJP.
Taking the advantage of Lok Sabha poll within a year of Assembly poll where left front was able to secure 50 seats in 60-member house, CPI(M) leaders are concentrating at booth level campaign and even the ministers including, Chief Minister Manik Sarkar, was also moving at family level to convince the voters for next Panchayat election.
Meanwhile, the Congress and Trinamool Congress have been campaigning against growing unemployment and joblessness, increasing incidences of crime against women, non-implementation of sixth central pay commission for govt employees as well as corruption and nepotism of CPI-M in implementation of centrally sponsored schemes.
To counter rigorous campaigning of CPI(M), both Congress and Trinamool Congress have announced to hold at least ten rallies with national leaders of the respective parties including Rahul Gandhi and Mamata Benarjee.
On the other hand, keeping aside the goal of winning the seats in Tripura, the BJP has targeted to emerge as second largest party in East Tripura tribal reserve constituency and third position in West Tripura constituency.
Interestingly, the relentless effort of all the parties to sway the voters, the campaign for NOTA as choice of voting by several NGOs across the state has become a cause of concern. (UNI)
