By Muslim Mirror Special Correspondent,
New Delhi: While accepting the defeat in Tripura which ended the Left Front’s 25-year-old rule in state, CPI (M) on Saturday said the BJP has “ utilised massive deployment of money and other resources to influence” the elections. The BJP and its alliance partner Indigenous People’s Front of Tripura (IPFT) swept the assembly polls by winning 43 seats and leaving CPI (M) at distant second with 16 seats only.
Reacting on the election results, CPI (M) Polit Bureau said it thanked the 45 per cent of the voters who extended support to the CPI (M) and the Left Front.
However, it blames massive use of money power and other factors for Left Front defeat and the win of BJP which had which had no MLAs in the 60-member House and had got only around 1.7 per cent votes in the assembly elections in 2013.
“The BJP has, apart from other factors, utilized massive deployment of money and other resources to influence the elections. The BJP was able to consolidate all the anti-Left votes virtually appropriating the erstwhile main opposition party, the Congress.”
It further said “the Party will carefully examine the reasons for this electoral setback and take necessary remedial measures”.
The CPI (M) also assured the people of Tripura that it will continue to champion the cause of all sections of the working people and uphold tribal-non tribal unity.
The verdict in Tripura has voted the Left Front out of office which has been in the power for the last 25 years while the BJP assiduously capture the opposition space.
After the win in Tripura and Nagaland and hung assembly in Meghalaya the ruling party at the Center has increased its footprint in the Christian and tribal-dominated North East region where local parties are the most ‘susceptible’ to money and can be controlled fairly easily as and when required, said a political analyst from the region. The exit of the Congress from most of the region and the disappearance of the popular Left government has left BJP with a clean field except for will lead to the formation of a BJP-IPFT alliance government in the state.
Meanwhile, CPI (M) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury and Polit Bureau Member Brinda Karat met the Chief Election Commissioner this evening seeking his intervention to ensure that counting is resumed in three booths of 23-Dhanpur assembly constituency of Tripura from where Chief Minister Manik Sarkar is contesting. Counting was stopped following the BJP’s objections.