April 28: Sonia Gandhi today gave Bengal a sneak preview of the way the next general elections will be fought, taking potshots at the CPM by referring to issues so far considered touchy.

Addressing rallies the Congress refused to call campaign meetings for next month’s panchayat polls, Sonia said she and her party were with the “oppressed people” of Nandigram.

“We know about the oppression of the people of Nandi-gram. Farmers, women and children there have undergone oppression unbecoming of a democracy. Humlog unke saath hai (We are with them),” the Congress president said in Behrampore.

This is the first time she has spoken publicly on Nandigram. Even at the height of the flare-up, the Congress central leadership had taken care not to be seen as embarrassing the CPM that is supporting the government at the Centre.

However, Sonia’s speeches today reflected the compulsions of electoral politics as well as the frost that has crept on the Congress’s relationship with the Left since the stand-off over the nuclear deal and the latest skirmishes over price rise.

Sonia touched upon price rise, too, which has opened a fresh flank between the Prime Minister and the Left. “The state government will have to keep the prices of vegetables under control and ensure smooth running of the public distribution system.”

She also renewed focus on a theme that has acquired a sharper edge after the forcible recapture of Nandigram by CPM cadres. “There is violence in Bengal politics. Congress workers are being continuously subjected to atrocities. Yeh galat hai, galat hai, galat hai (this is wrong, wrong, wrong).”

The tone for the campaign for the next general elections, due before May 2009, was set by the Congress president when she said: “We took the support of secular parties to keep the BJP at bay. But that does not mean we can’t go it alone. The Congress wouldn’t sacrifice its ideologies and policies.”

Sonia took a helicopter from Calcutta and landed in Behrampore at 10.25am. She left the Murshidabad district he-adquarters half an hour later for neighbouring Malda.

The panchayat polls in the state are only a fortnight away and the Congress controls the Murshidabad and Malda zilla parishads.

State Congress leaders had taken pains in the run-up to Sonia’s visit to clarify that she was not coming to campaign for the rural polls. But foreign minister Pranab Mukherjee told the rally: “Please vote for the Congress to help us retain the zilla parishad.”