By IANS,
Kolkata : West Bengal’s principal opposition party Trinamool Congress is yet to decide its stand on an alliance with the Congress in the coming Lok Sabha polls.
“We cannot take such important decision overnight,” Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee told reporters here Thursday.
When asked about West Bishnupur assembly constituency by-election in South 24 Parganas district, which is scheduled to be held Feb 26, she said: “It’s just courtesy campaigning. The Congress workers are campaigning for Trinamool Congress candidate as their party had decided not to field any candidate for that seat.”
Earlier, the Congress had withdrawn their candidate, Gazi Mumtazuddin, who was nominated to contest from the West Bishnupur constituency seat in the coming assembly by-poll.
“We also did the same thing in Malda district’s Sujapur assembly constituency by-poll as we did not announce any candidate from our party to contest from that seat. We also did campaigning for the Congress in that assembly by-election,” Banerjee added.
The Trinamool Congress has fielded Madan Mitra for the seat. Mitra, a youth and taxi union leader, had lost to the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) candidate Rathin Sarkar by around 4,500 votes in the 2006 state assembly election.
Sarkar’s death necessitated the by-poll.
The CPI-M has fielded Iskandar Hossein for the upcoming by-election.