Mamata Banerjee and Amit Shah to rally in South 24 Parganas on Thursday

News Desk: For the second time this month, Union Home Minister Amit Shah will visit West Bengal on Thursday to intensify the BJP’s election campaigning in the state. While Shah will flag off a parivartan yatra of the BJP in South 24 Parganas district, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee will hold a workers’ meet in the same district.

After arriving in Kolkata on Wednesday night, Shah will first visit Bharat Sevashram Sangha in Rash Behari before taking a chopper to Gangasagar, where he will visit Kapil Muni Ashram. After the visit, Shah will address a public meeting at Namkhana in South 24 Parganas district. After that Shah will visit Narayanpur village to have lunch at the residence of a refugee family. Following this, Shah will visit Kakdwip to flag off the fifth and final ‘parivartan yatra’ of the BJP and take part in a road show. Shah will then return to the city to visit Aurobindo Bhawan.

In a bid to counter Shah’s visit, the TMC has organised a workers’ meet at Pailan in the same district that will be attended by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and MP Abhishek Banerjee, her nephew. The TMC plans to turn it into a mega event, party sources said.

“There will be a huge turnout – of over one lakh people – in our event on Thursday,” claimed TMC leader Shaukat Molla.

The BJP, on the other hand, said the turnout at its programme would be “even bigger than that of TMC’s”. “Tomorrow Amit Shah ji will flag off a parivartan yatra from Kakdwip. This is going to be a massive event with the participation of large number of people. The TMC only cries foul as there is hardly any turnout in their programmes,” said state BJP vice-president Raju Banerjee.

The BJP plans to take the parivartan yatra through Sirakol in Diamond Harbour, the area where the convoy of BJP national president JP Nadda was attacked on December 10 last year.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to inaugurate a four-km extension of the city’s north-south Metro corridor from Noapara to Dakshineshwar on February 22. He is also expected to hold a public meeting in Hooghly’s Chinsurah, his second public meeting in the poll-bound state. To counter Modi’s public meeting, Mamata Banerjee will hold a rally in the same venue on February 24.