Mamata waits for Cong to blink

Coalition of unwilling

Convinced that the Congress-led UPA II has become disconnected from people’s mandate but unwilling to walk out of the coalition on her own, Mamata Banerjee, in an extension of her “politics of divergence”, is doing everything to force the Congress to make the mistake of throwing her out of the alliance.

Her diatribe against Congress, including her opposition to UPA’s presidential candidate Pranab Mukherjee, is nothing but an indication of her keenness to contest the 2014 Lok Sabha election alone.

“Mamata’s scuttling of Teesta water treaty with Bangladesh, her opposition to FDI in multi-brand retail, NCTC and the UPA’s land acquisition Bill were all moves aimed at alienating herself from the government. Finally, opposition to Pranab Mukherjee’s nomination is the climax,” a senior Congress leader said. 

On Monday last, after the meeting with MPs and MLAs, Banerjee was present when Trinamool Congress spokesperson said that the party had no intention to topple the government and destabilise the country, but, if Congress considered their party a burden, they would have to spell it out and Trinamool Congress would walk out of the alliance.

The clear indication was that the TMC chief wanted Congress to make the first move.

Banerjee, in her post on Facebook, not only criticised Congress for its “murky” politics where “values and public interest have been compromised through the use of  money power and scams”, but also used “Machiavellian manipulations and machinations” to hint at Sonia, who, according to her, was responsible for ‘corruption’ and ‘backroom deal making’.