Calcutta, May 24: Congress Rajya Sabha MP Jairam Ramesh today said there was a likelihood of a Trinamul-BJP alliance, adding that MAMATA was an acronym for 'Modi and Mamata are trusted allies'.

Referring to Union finance minister Arun Jaitley's ruling out the possibility of a tie-up yesterday, Ramesh told a news conference in Calcutta: 'Jaitley is an effective spinner in Indian politics. Quite the opposite of what he says happens.'

'Trinamul and the BJP are two sides of the same coin. There are several similarities between Modi and Mamata. In fact, the very word MAMATA is an acronym for 'Modi and Mamata are trusted allies',' he said while talking to reporters at the state Congress headquarters at Bidhan Bhavan.

The former Union minister's visit to Bengal was part of the Congress leadership's countrywide campaign to counter the publicity blitz the Narendra Modi government will launch from the day after tomorrow on the completion of its one year in office. In his efforts to 'put the record straight' on the BJP-Trinamul equations, Jaitley had said yesterday: 'We are politically opposed to each other. There can never be political alliance between us. We are opposed to them (Trinamul) and remain opposed.'

The Bengal BJP has been trying to dispel misgivings of a section of party workers about a possible understanding between Trinamul and the BJP in the aftermath of the 'shoulder-to-shoulder cooperation' advocated by Modi and Mamata Banerjee during the Prime Minister's visit to the state earlier this month.

Yesterday, state BJP president Rahul Sinha had asserted in Malda that the party 'will not leave any space for Trinamul in the state' even though the chief minister might share a 'good relation' with the Prime Minister and some other BJP leaders.

In order to buttress his argument in favour of a possible 'BJP-Trinamul alliance', Ramesh drew a similarity between Modi and Mamata. 'If there is a one-man government in Delhi with no powers to other ministers, here is a one-woman government in Bengal. As Modi during his one-year tenure has failed to fulfil the tall promises he had made before the Lok Sabha polls, Mamata's paribartan has proved to be false during her four years in office,' the Congress leader said.

Asked about Modi's silence on the Saradha scam during his visit to Bengal, Ramesh said: 'There has been a slowdown in the investigation into the various scams in Bengal. There was no mention of Saradha even by the Prime Minister and other BJP leaders. I am not saying it is a conspiracy but the fanfare with which all these investigations started, there now seems to be an interruption. Have they become tired or is it something else?'

Ramesh predicted that the Congress would emerge as a viable alternative in Bengal to counter the ruling Trinamul.

'In recent elections, it is amply demonstrated that the Congress is a force to reckon with in Bengal. The BJP's growth has stalled. So, the Congress is bound to emerge as a viable alternative force in the 2016 Assembly polls,' he said.