West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee announced on Monday that prominent Trinamool Congress leader and sitting MP Suvendu Adhikary will contest from the Nandigram seat in the 2016 Assembly polls.
“I want Suvendu Adhikary to become a Minister. He will take forward our developmental works in Nandigram,” said Ms. Banerjee at a government programme at the Tekhali area in Nandigram.
Her comment assumes significance as the Assembly elections are round the corner and is being seen as a move to pacify the local Trinamool workers among whom Mr. Adhikary wields considerable influence. He was also at the forefront of the agitation against land acquisition by the Left Front government for a chemical hub in 2007.
A large section of the local TMC workers were reportedly disgruntled with the party leadership when Mr. Adhikary was removed from the post of the State president of the Trinamool Youth Congress.
Pointing out that the anti-land acquisition movement in 2007 played a pivotal role in the TMC coming to power, Ms. Banerjee said she had “never forgotten” Nandigram.
“Singur and Nandigram have been milestones in my life,” she said. Recently the Communist Party of India (Marxist) had accused her of “deserting” the people of Nandigram and shedding “crocodile tears” for them.
‘A dark chapter’
Ms. Banerjee also made it clear that no chemical hub would come up in Nandigram. “The atrocities carried out in Nandigram were a dark chapter in the history of Bengal. We will never allow a repeat,” she said.