Do not hinder Durga immersion or stop Saraswati Puja, Shah warns Mamata
Kolkata, Aug 11: BJP President Amit Shah on Saturday warned West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee not to hinder Durga idol immersion or the Saraswati worship in the state, saying his party activists will "bring down Banerjee's secretariat brick by brick" if such things ever recurred.
He said these festivals will be celebrated with full fervour if BJP formed government in Bengal.
"They (Trinamool Congress) do not allow the immersion of the Durga idols after puja. Saraswati Puja has been stopped in many schools in Bengal. Should that happen? Form a BJP government in Bengal, Durga immersion and Saraswati Puja will take place with full fervour. No one can stop that," Shah said during his rally at Kolkata's Mayo Road.
"Mamata didi, do not dare (to do such things) again. If you dare to do this next time, the BJP activists will bring down your secretariat brick by brick, but the Durga puja will take place at any cost," he said amid cheers from thousands of party activists.
The Durga Puja immersion processions were delayed over the past few years in certain parts of Bengal as Muharram rallies and the two events coincided.
Accusing Banerjee and her party of minority appeasement and vote bank politics, Shah asked the Bengal Chief Minister to tell the people what she was trying to achieve by stopping Saraswati Puja in the state and by settling Rohingya and Bangladeshi infiltrators in the state.
"There is a limit to doing appeasement and vote bank politics... there will be no Saraswati Puja in Bengal... Rohingya and Bangladeshi infiltrators are allowed to settle here. What are you trying to turn Bengal into? Mamata must clarify this to the people," he said.
The BJP leader also accused the Trinamool Congress supremo of stopping a number of television channels from telecasting his speech.
"But I have full faith in our party activists. They will go to every village, every street and every household of Bengal to tell them about Trinamool's activities," he added.
Shah said he would tour all districts in Bengal and start an agitation to throw out the Trinamool Congress.
"Turn the pages of history of democracy. Whenever anybody has tried to throttle the voice of democracy, the voice of protest has amplified to reach the masses. In democracy, no one can throttle anybody's voice," he added.
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Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
