Congress to field candidates in all seats in Panchayat polls

Congress On Sunday said it would field candidates for all seats in the Panchayat polls slated for next year, after Trinamool Congress decided to fight the rural elections in the state alone.

"The Congress will put up candidates in all the 61,000 seats in the Panchayat polls in the state. The district pradesh congress committees have been asked to prepare for the Panchayat polls which we will fight alone," WBPCC president Pradip Bhattacharya told a public gathering at the DVC ground in Gopalnagar area of Singur.

Bhattacharya said to solve the Singur land problem, the state government should go for an out-of-court settlement with the Tatas.

Congress MP and Murshidabad district Congress president Adhir Choudhary said the Trinamool Congress wanted a discussion in Parliament on the fertiliser price rise issue but when a farmer asks the same question at Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's public meeting in West Midnapore district he is termed a 'Maoist' and sent to jail by the state government.

The previous Left Front government had divided the people of the state into "we and they" and the Trinamool Congress is dividing the people of Singur into "willing and unwilling farmers," Chowdhury alleged.