Narendra Modi on Friday took a boat ride on the Hooghly and interacted with a section of boatmen and morning walkers in Calcutta, prompting Mamata Banerjee to claim that it was the Prime Minister's political ploy with an eye on the polls.
The chief minister has also reminded him about the pollution of the Yamuna and contrasted it with how serene and clean the river is in Bengal.
“Today, he (Modi) enjoyed a boat ride. He should compare the Ganga of Bengal with Delhi’s Yamuna. Bengal’s Ganga is clean, and that is why you enjoyed the boat ride. It is part of election-time politics and photo ops. It is nice that you had a boat ride and a photoshoot on the Ganga. I also travel through the Ganga in Chandernagore and go to Gangasagar. Can you take a dip in the Yamuna in Delhi? How is Delhi’s Yamuna? It is completely polluted. You can’t manage the Yamuna, and yet you take photographs in our Ganga,” Mamata said at an election campaign rally.
Modi had been extensively campaigning in Bengal for the past two days, and BJP sources said he would attend rallies and road shows till April 26. Around 6am on Friday, he arrived at Gwalior Ghat and boarded a wooden boat holding a camera.
The Prime Minister later shared several pictures on social media expressing his happiness during the ride. He also spoke to a group of boatmen and morning walkers.
Pictures and videos of Modi in dark shades, taking a boat ride with the iconic Howrah Bridge as the backdrop, went viral on social media.
"The Ganges holds a very special place for every Bengali. It can be said that the Ganges flows through the soul of Bengal. The holy Ganges water carries the eternal spirit of the entire civilization. This morning in Kolkata, I spent some time on the banks of the Hooghly River—an opportunity to express my gratitude to Mother Ganga," Modi wrote on his X handle.
A source said seven boats were booked by the Prime Minister’s Office to ensure his security, and no one had been informed earlier that he would be travelling along the river.
The Trinamool Congress began promoting Mamata’s narrative on Yamuna pollution on its social media handles after the chief minister flagged the issue.
“Narendra Modi could not enjoy a boat ride on the Yamuna. The toxic foam that has blanketed the river under his government’s watch made that impossible. So he came to Bengal. Clean rivers. Clean governance. Clean conscience. Everything Delhi lacks under the BJP, Bengal has maintained under Maa-Mati-Manush.....,” the TMC wrote on its official social media handle.
Reports suggest the Yamuna gets polluted before entering Delhi, with Gurgaon playing a major role in contributing to the pollution. Recently, the National Green Tribunal (NGT) issued notices to the Centre and the Uttar Pradesh government over alleged pollution of the Yamuna in Mathura and Vrindavan, following a petition claiming the river’s water quality had fallen to the “very poor” category.
Union home minister Amit Shah mocked Mamata’s criticism, claiming that even if Modi mistakenly asked people to vote for Trinamool, the Bengal chief minister would urge them not to do so.
“Modiji will certainly not say this, but even if he mistakenly asks people to vote for the TMC, she (Mamata) will come up and urge people not to vote for her party because Modiji has said so,” Shah said at a news conference.