New TMC campaign to seek feedback on Mamata's development work

Days after launching a website and a helpline to address people's woes, the Trinamool Congress on Friday started a new online campaign to give netizens an opportunity to express why they were proud of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.

With hashtag 'Amar Gorbo Mamata' (Mamata, My Pride) on a Twitter page of the same name, the party aims to seek feedback on the development work it has carried out over the past eight years, a senior TMC leader said.

"People will be able to share their experiences and give reasons to explain why they were proud of Mamata Banerjee. We, at TMC, are proud of Didi, and now this new campaign will help us find out about the experience of others," he said.

The BJP, however, said the campaign was an "insult" to luminaries and thinkers of Bengal.

"We, Bengalis, are proud of our leading lights Raja Rammohan Roy, Swami Vivekananda, and Rabindranath Tagore. Now if we say 'Mamata is My Pride', it would be a slap on the face of the entire Bengali community," BJP vice-president Jai Prakash Majumdar claimed.

Buffeted by reverses in recent Lok Sabha polls, the chief minister on Monday launched helpline 9137091370 and website www.didikebolo.com to enable people to have a direct interface with party functionaries.

The project is a part of TMC's mass outreach programme, believed to be conceived by political strategist Prashant Kishor, who has been signed up to strengthen the party's foothold in the state ahead of assembly polls in 2021.

According to TMC sources, the website has received over two lakh calls in the first two days.

In the general election earlier this year, the BJP clinched 18 of the 42 Lok Sabha seats in the state.