CPI (M), Congress have formed an unlawful alliance to halt TMC: Mamata

Launching a frontal attack on the opposition parties, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday alleged that the Congress and CPI (M) have entered into an unlawful alliance to stop the development taking place in the state under the Trinamool Congress (TMC) regime.

Mamata, who announced the candidature list for the upcoming assembly polls, also made it absolutely clear that the TMC would not join hands with any political party under the present circumstances.

"We have tried our best in these four and a half years. The TMC will contest alone in West Bengal. We have always fought against the CPI (M) as I feel that this party believes in negativity. They believe in strikes and violence. They got the opportunity to rule for 34 years but did nothing. There has been an unlawful alliance of Congress and CPI (M)," she said.

The TMC supremo also trained her guns on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which is looking to establish its foot in the state courtesy Prime Minister Narendra Modi's leadership.

"The BJP has also somewhere joined hands with them as they too don't want the TMC to work cordially with the people of West Bengal. You can understand it if you analyse some of their performances," she said.

Mamata also reached the occasion to reach out to the women and backward classes in the state.

"In 2011, the number of women candidates we had was 31. We have increased them to 45 this year. The number of minority candidates was 38 which we have increased this time to 57, almost by 20 percent. This is one of the developments," she added.

The election in West Bengal will be held in six phases in which the polling for first phase will take place on April 4 and 11. Polling for the second phase will be held on April 17, the third phase on April 21, fourth on April 25 and the fifth and six phases on April 30 and May 5 respectively.

The counting of votes will take place on May 19.

The Election Commission has this time decided to display photos of the contesting candidates to dispel confusion about their identities, as many have similar names. This time a symbol of NOTA will also be provided in the EVMs.