DAYS after her MP suggested the same, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday said that she was ready to take up the leadership of the INDIA bloc. In an interview to News18 Bangla, Mamata said: "I had formed the INDIA bloc, now it is up to those leading the front to manage it. If they can't run the show, what can I do? I would just say that everyone needs to be taken along.” Asked if she would take charge of the bloc, she said: "If given the opportunity, I would ensure its smooth functioning." The strain within the INDIA bloc has been growing since the recent Assembly poll setbacks suffered by the Congress, dampening the high of the Lok Sabha results. The Trinamool Congress, in particular, has kept its distance from the Congress, not entering into any electoral alliance with the party. In the interview, Mamata said she was up to managing the INDIA bloc along with her responsibilities as CM. "I don't want to go outside Bengal, but I can run it (the INDIA bloc) from here," she said. While the Congress, the presumptive leader of the INDIA bloc as its largest party, refused to comment on the TMC chief’s remarks, other partners reacted with caution, saying that the proposition had not come up for discussion in their ranks. “First such issues need to be discussed internally. Once that is done, the parties can make their stands clear,” said an MP of an INDIA bloc party. CPI general secretary D Raja, who said earlier this week that Left parties were not being accommodated in INDIA seat-sharing as they should have been, told The Indian Express that while he didn’t want to react to what Mamata had said, “the Congress does need to introspect”. “There have been issues in seat-sharing, and they need to be addressed,” he said. In recent days, the Samajwadi Party, which refused to humour the Congress for the Assembly bypolls in Uttar Pradesh, has stayed away from the Adani protests in Parliament, led by the Congress and particularly Rahul Gandhi. On Tuesday, the Shiv Sena (UBT) asked the Congress to introspect and take steps for Opposition unity, in view of the Aam Aadmi Party announcing that it will go solo in the Delhi Assembly polls. After the Maharashtra Assembly poll washout of the Congress and the TMC’s sweep of the Bengal by-elections, TMC MP Kalyan Banerjee first suggested that the Congress and other INDIA bloc parties should set aside their egos and recognise Mamata as the leader of the Opposition alliance. In the interview, Mamata also said that Parliament should be discussing the “persecution” of Hindus in Bangladesh. “Why is it not being discussed in the Winter Session?. Why are the Prime Minister, Foreign Minister not giving a statement?. There can be a geographical border between the two countries, but the heart has no borders,” she said. The Winter Session has so far hardly seen any business, due to adjournments in response to the Opposition protests seeking a discussion on the Adani issue, among other matters. The government allegations against the Congress of colluding with foreign groups to “derail” India have also washed out the proceedings. In the interview Mamata addressed the R G Kar rape-murder issue too, and the widespread protests that followed in Bengal. “I told the parents of the victim that, wait for a month, we will punish the culprit. But, before that, the case was handed over to the CBI. Now, it has been proved that the whole movement was politically motivated.”
