TMC to complain to ECI if PM Modi's meditation is televised: Mamata

West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday said the Trinamool Congress (TMC) will complain to the Election Commission of India (ECI) if Prime Minister Narendra Modi's meditation in Kanyakumari is televised, alleging that it would amount to violation of the model code of conduct (MCC).

PM Modi is scheduled to meditate at Vivekananda Rock Memorial, the monument built in tribute to Swami Vivekananda in Kanyakumari, following the culmination of the Lok Sabha election campaign on 30 May, according to BJP leaders.

"We will complain. He can meditate, but television cannot show it," she said, alleging that this will amount to violation of the MCC. "Does anyone have to get cameras to do meditation?" she asked, claiming that it was a way of campaigning during the 'silence period' between the end of campaigning and the poll date.

According to BJP leaders, Modi will meditate from the evening of 30 May to the evening of 1 June at Dhyana Mandapam, the place where Vivekananda — a spiritual icon admired by Modi — is believed to have had a divine vision about 'Bharat Mata'.

Speaking at an election meeting at the same ground where PM Modi held a meeting on Tuesday to campaign for the BJP candidate in Jadavpur constituency, the TMC chief claimed that he (Modi) goes for meditation for 48 hours before the final phase polling is to be held before every election. The prime minister had gone on a similar meditation exercise in a Kedarnath cave after the 2019 poll campaign.

Banerjee accused the BJP dispensation at the Centre of selling off stake in government-owned companies. "If they (BJP) come back to power this time, there will not be any political party, elections, independence, religion, humanity or culture," she said.

The TMC supremo sought to reject Modi's statement that the BJP will emerge with the best results this election in Bengal, stating, "This means they have lost, they will get rosogolla (zero) in Bengal." Stating that the TMC will give its "support" to the opposition INDIA alliance for forming a government in Delhi, she urged the people not to vote for the CPI(M) or Congress in Bengal.

"That will help the BJP," she said, at a campaign meeting at Baruipur before the seventh phase election to nine Lok Sabha seats in West Bengal, which has a total of 42 seats. "Had I not come out of the Congress and formed the Trinamool Congress, then even today we would not have been able to defeat the CPI(M) in Bengal," she said.

Stating that she fought against the CPI(M) for 34 years to throw its government out of Bengal, she said "If we could achieve that, we can also defeat the BJP and we will do it."