"Her Countdown Has Begun": Union Minister Giriraj Singh takes a dig at TMC chief Mamata Banerjee

Union minister Giriraj Singh Sunday alleged Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress party is perpetrating politics of violence in West Bengal out of frustration as her countdown has begun. The comments of Mr Singh, a senior BJP leader, came a day after the killing of four persons in clashes between the activists of the party and the Trinamool (TMC) in the neighouring West Bengal.

Accusing the TMC of being responsible the killings, Singh said, "She (Banerjee) has begun to take recourse to the same tactics as the Left Front which preceded her in power and which she had vowed to end."

The TMC had ousted the CPI(M)-led Left Front government in 2011 after it ruled West Bengal for 34 years.

"In election after election - from the local bodies to the Lok Sabha - she has been facing people's wrath. Democracy has no place for violence, but she is using it out of frustration. Her countdown has begun," Mr Singh told reporters.

The Bharatiya Janata Party won 18 of the 42 Lok Sabha seats in West Bengal, only four less than the TMC's 22.

Read: Giriraj Singh Compares Trinamool Chief Mamata Banerjee's Political 'suppression' To Another Nation's Supreme Leader

The Union minister had earlier claimed that the TMC chief has been trying to suppress her political opponents with such a ruthlessness that is comparable only to North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

To a query as to whether the Modi government would push forward its electoral promise of abrogating Article 370 with the BJP enjoying a brute majority in the Lok Sabha, Mr Singh said, "All decisions will be made considering the national interest, this much I can assure."

The BJP leader, who won his Lok Sabha seat by a margin of more than four lakh votes over his nearest CPI rival Kanhaiya Kumar, expressed confidence that the NDA "under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the Centre and Chief Minister Nitish Kumar" will repeat its stellar performance in the assembly polls in Bihar next year.

Mr Singh, who is the minister of Animal Husbandry and Fisheries, said his endeavour would be to "help fulfil the prime minister's promise of doubling the farmers' income through improving livestock".

"Dairy, pig rearing, fisheries and poultry all these have enormous potential. We will tap into that. We shall make use of embryo transplant to improve milk production and artificial insemination so that bovines produce more female offspring," he added.