Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee on Friday mocked CPI(M) and Congress for their efforts to forge an alliance ahead of the Assembly polls in West Bengal, a reaction which the opposition parties termed as "a reflection of her fear of losing".
"CPI(M) and Congress are committing a mistake by trying to forge an alliance. If BJP is helping them then it too is committing a mistake. You can change your shirt everyday but you can't change your ideology everyday. They are sacrificing their ideology in order to forge an alliance.
"If you sacrifice your ideology for the sake of power and money what is left with you? Nothing I am neither Leftist nor Rightist. I am progressive. A person may die but his/her ideology lives on. They are committing a mistake," Banerjee said at TMC's extended general council meeting in Kolkata.
Hitting out at the Left Party, Banerjee said "CPI(M) used to call Congress Bofors Gandhi. They used to criticise Indira Gandhi as fascist, hurl abuses at her. We have seen those days. Now it is the same CPI(M) which is calling for an alliance with Congress."
The TMC chief said she had walked out of the UPA II government at the Centre as Congress was pursuing anti-people policies.
Reacting to her charges, the CPI-M and Congress leadership said it was the fear of losing the polls that Banerjee was talking about ideology.
"It is a joke that Mamata Banerjee is talking about ideology. TMC itself is a party which doesn't have any ideology. Actually Mamata Banerjee is afraid of alliance. She is very well aware that if there is an alliance she will lose the next elections," senior CPI(M) leader Sujan Chakraborty said.
