Kolkata, May 30 (IANS) Trinamool Congress supremo and former Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee held the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the new state government ruled by it responsible for the heckling and physical assault of Trinamool Congress general secretary and Lok Sabha member Abhishek Banerjee, also her nephew, at Sonarpur in South 24 Parganas district earlier in the day.

The former Chief Minister issued a brief social media post on Saturday evening, claiming that the ruler in West Bengal had now become a killer.

“RULERS BECAME KILLERS – shame on you BJP,” Mamata Banerjee observed in her post while sharing another post from Trinamool Congress along with a video of the assault on Abhishek Banerjee at Sonarpur.

The Trinamool Congress post, shared by Mamata Banerjee, said Abhishek Banerjee had refused to abandon the grieving family of Sanju Karmakar. Even after a vicious attack by BJP-backed miscreants, the party’s national general secretary chose not to turn back and instead stood beside the family.

Congress national president Mallikarjun Kharge also issued a strongly worded social media statement condemning the attack on Abhishek Banerjee.

He said he strongly condemned the shocking attack on MP Abhishek Banerjee in Sonarpur as he went to meet families affected by post-poll violence in the state.

Kharge added that the deliberate lack of adequate police protection for a prominent Opposition leader spoke volumes about the BJP’s politics of vendetta and persecution.

He said the Government of West Bengal and the Union Government must ensure security for all Opposition leaders and take immediate steps to prevent such attacks, stressing that political differences could never justify violence.

Former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister and currently the Leader of the Opposition in the state assembly, Akhilesh Yadav, also issued a statement condemning the incident at Sonarpur.

He said that by orchestrating a murderous attack on Abhishek Banerjee, a key leader of the Trinamool Congress in Bengal, the anarchic BJP government in Bengal had proven it was capable of nothing but hate-filled, negative, violent politics.

Yadav added that even in such a sensitive environment, the absence of police arrangements pointed to a major conspiracy, calling the incident utterly condemnable.

–IANS

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