Calcutta: Trinamul on Monday dubbed the BJP a "syndicate peddling religious extremism and lynchings", hours after Narendra Modi accused the Mamata Banerjee government of "running a syndicate raj" and "throttling democracy".
The "point-by-point rebuttal to the fake allegations raised by the BJP leader" came in a scathing statement that warned the saffron camp against "playing with fire".
"Syndicate - who knows better than BJP leaders about syndicate? Your party is a syndicate that peddles religious extremism. Your party is a syndicate for fanatics. Your party is a lynching syndicate. Your party is a torture syndicate. Your party is a syndicate for (central) agencies. Your party is a syndicate which created demonetisation. Your party is a syndicate of corruption," said the statement, issued jointly by Trinamul secretary-general Partha Chatterjee and Rajya Sabha leader Derek O'Brien.
Mamata, asked about Modi's comments, said she had "nothing to add" to her party's statement.
"BJP leaders should not play with fire. Try as you may to harass us with your agencies, we will not bow down to any BJP syndicate. Bengal is for all. It is the cultural capital of the world. The BJP leader's speech proved that they have no development agenda at all. He (Modi) came and gave a political bhashan (speech). The net result is ZERO, ZERO, ZERO," the statement said.
Mamata, one of Modi's most vocal critics, has been trying to stitch together a coalition of non-BJP forces ahead of the Lok Sabha polls next year. The BJP, a distant fourth after Trinamul, Left and the Congress in Bengal till 2014, has made significant inroads in recent years, improving vote share and emerging as the state's principal Opposition party.
Trinamul countered allegations of farmers' suicides in Bengal - the statement cited "a parliamentary report" that put such deaths in BJP-ruled Maharashtra "at 635 and zero in Bengal" in the first quarter of 2017.
The Trinamul statement claimed Modi's rally on Monday was attended mostly by people from neighbouring Bihar, Jharkhand and Odisha. "There were hardly any locals or farmers. There was a lot of corporate money spent for this political meeting but what has been the net result? How have the farmers benefited?"
The statement questioned Modi's plan to "double" agricultural incomes by 2022 and claimed farmers' earnings had more than tripled "to Rs 2.9 lakh" annually in Bengal between 2011, when Trinamul came to power, and last year.
