NEW DELHI, May 2: The BJP may have caused an upset win in Nandigram with its candidate, the Trinamool Congress turn-coat Suvendu Adhikari is claimed to defeated the West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee by a margin of 1,600 votes.
The Trinamool Congress on its official Twitter handle said the counting process has not ended yet, asking everyone to not speculate the results.
After Mamata Banerjee was reported to have defeated Suvendu Adhikari by a slim margin of 1,200 votes, BJP claimed Adhikari won the seat by 1,600 seats. The Nandigram result is yet to be declared officially.
As the counting began on Sunday morning, Adhikari was maintaining a comfortable margin in the trends but in the afternoon, Mamata overtook Adhikari and media reports said won the seat by 1,200 seats. Soon after, BJP’s Amit Malviya said Adhikari won the seat by 1,622 votes.
While this flip-flop was going on, Mamata addressed a press conference where she said she will move the court — not only regarding Nandigram results but also against the Election Commission. Saying that she will welcome whatever verdict Nandigram gives, she termed Trinamool’s victory as ‘landslide’.
“Forget Nandigram. For struggle, you have to sacrifice something. I struggled for Nandigram because I fought a movement. So now I have forgotten that. It’s okay. Let Nandigram give whatever verdict it has to give. I accept that. I don’t mind. It’s nothing. It’s just a match,” she said.
Accusing the Election Commission of bias, Mamata said, “We won. BJP has lost the election even after playing so many dirty politics. Senior officials are saying we are under watch. I know each and everything. We have faced horror. We have faced the horror of the Election Commission.”
Mamata said she will move the court as she has information that after the declaration of the results, some manipulations took place. She said she will also appeal to all political parties to jointly move the Constitution Bench
“Ultimately, I will go to the Constitution bench because whatever the commission did this time in Bengal if you allow this bias to happen, then there will be no democracy left. I will appeal to all political parties. We will approach the Supreme Court together,” Mamata said.
“When I was asked about ‘double engine’ in a television interview, I said Trinamool will score a double century. I am thanking people because this is the victory of people, Bengal’s mothers and sisters. Bengal has saved the country. This is a landslide victory because we had to fight with several odds — with the Centre, with the agencies,” Mamata said.
(Manas Dasgupta)