KOLKATA: West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress on Monday inducted two former Congress leaders from Uttar Pradesh ahead of assembly elections in the state early next year, declaring that she waited for the Congress but did not receive a response.

“We respect all small and regional parties. In whichever state we go, we will not impose our decisions on anyone. I know the character of India. Every state has its own culture. We will stand with the people of that region. Akhilesh (Yadav) is like my younger brother. I am not against him. Our job is to raise issues. I waited for the Congress but sadly, they did not respond,” Mamata Banerjee said at an event in north Bengal’s Siliguri town, a remark seen to explain why the TMC hadn’t tied up with other opposition parties in UP.

The event was organised to welcome UP’s Rajesh Pati Tripathi and son, Lalitesh Pati Tripathi, to the Trinamool Congress. The induction ceremony for the two UP politicians – Rajesh is the grandson of veteran Congress leader and former chief minister Kamalapati Tripathi who died in 1990 – coincided with the TMC launching its election campaign in Goa, the other state where the party hopes to make inroads in state elections early next year.

Banerjee said the two leaders Rajesh Pati Tripathi and Lalitesh Pati Tripathi, resigned from the Congress before joining the TMC.

“When we decided to contest the Goa elections, people said we are a regional party. We all come from some region or the other but we are all Indians. TMC is a national party. There is no such lakshman rekha (boundary) in politics. The lakshman rekha should be applicable only for rioters,” she said.

“I have visited UP several times, as a member of Parliament and as a union minister. For the azaadi (independence) of UP, we have welcomed members of a family that contributed to India’s fight for Independence,” said Banerjee, referring to Kamalapati Tripathi, a freedom fighter who served as UP chief minister for two years between 1971 and 1973, was appointed Congress working president by Indira Gandhi in 1983 but eventually targeted Rajiv Gandhi with his “a-letter-a-day” pushback on the state of the party.

Mamata Banerjee said she and nephew Abhishek Banerjee will visit Uttar Pradesh after Chhat puja on November 10. “They have invited me to watch Ganga arati at the river bank in Varanasi,” she said, referring to the Tripathis.

Former UP legislator Rajesh Pati Tripathi, said: “The distance between the Congress and its workers has widened in recent times. No goal should be difficult to achieve if we have a leader like Mamata Banerjee.”

Asked whether the TMC can do better than the Congress in UP, he said, “Our aim is to serve the people. This is a big fight but one must remember that Mamata Banerjee ended the 34-year-long rule of the Left Front in Bengal when nobody thought she could do it.”

Son Lalitesh Pati Tripathi said, “People of UP have always presented alternative powers before the country. Mamata Didi sent us a message and we accepted it.”

Chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s nephew and TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee was present at the event when the Tripathis switched camps.

Hours before the announcement, he campaigned at Dinhata in north Bengal’s Cooch Behar district where assembly bypoll will be held on October 30.

While asking voters to defeat the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which won the seat in the March-April polls by a thin margin of 57 votes, Abhishek Banerjee focused on Goa.

“I am telling in front of all television cameras that after three months the TMC will come to power in Goa. Write this down. We will win in Goa and then move to Meghalaya, Assam, Tripura and Uttar Pradesh. People take vaccines to defeat the coronavirus. Mamata Banerjee is the vaccine against the BJP,” said the TMC Lok Sabha member.

Rival parties scoff at TMC plans

West Bengal Congress president Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said the TMC’s freshly-minted UP leaders won’t make a difference.

“What difference does it make if people whose ancestors were Congress leaders join the TMC? How many people know them? If Mamata Banerjee is so keen on weakening the BJP, why is she inducting people from the Congress, the only national force against the saffron camp. She should be creating cracks in the BJP instead. Who is she helping at the end of the day? Her actions are benefitting the BJP,” said Chowdhury.

Abhishek Banerjee, seen as the driving force behind the TMC’s expansion plans announced on June 8, said his party will set up units in other states with the sole aim to win elections and face the BJP head-on.

Encouraged by the TMC’s resounding victory over the BJP in the March-April Bengal polls, the TMC has renewed its contract with Indian Political Action Committee, or I-PAC, the company founded by election strategist Prashant Kishor, till the crucial 2024 Lok Sabha polls in which Mamata Banerjee wishes to see her party playing a bigger role in national politics. Kishor is interacting with leaders of regional and national parties on behalf of the TMC.

BJP leader and leader of the Opposition in the Bengal assembly Suvendu Adhikari attacked the TMC. “A hunchback always dreams of lying supine but his dreams never come true. The TMC’s daydreams will end in a nightmare. It is not a party but a private limited company run by Mamata Banerjee and her nephew,” he said at a campaign meeting for the Gosaba assembly bypoll in South 24 Parganas district.