TIPRA (Tripura Indigenous Progressive Regional Alliance) chairman Pradyot Kishore Debbarman on Monday said that he would speak to the Prime Minister of India pertaining to the issue of direct funding for TTAADC as he felt direct funding was the only solution.
“I will speak to the Prime Minister of India for direct funding of TTAADC once TIPRA gets the majority mandate in the forthcoming elections. We will be also accountable to the government of India”, he told a news conference at his residence.
In his sharp reaction to the recent press conference of the BJP where Deputy Chief Minister Jishnu Dev Varma said that TIPRA had some tacit understanding with the CPIM, he said, “Some statements are being made against our party that we have some understanding with other parties. I want to clarify that. The whole genesis of the communist movement in the state was against my family. For me having any understanding with them is unthinkable”.
Further justifying his stand, he said, “My agenda neither has any links with the Right wing parties nor the Left. I am at the Centre. Is it wrong to have a political party that is not either with the CPIM or the BJP ? I have my own set of goals of doing something for the people of my state and that’s in the core motto of my party”.
Pradyot also said that these kinds of confusions were being triggered in the political sphere of the state just to confuse the voters.
“As soon as they have realized the fact that there are less possibilities of winning the elections, they have resorted to these tactics in order to influence the voters. It is really not acceptable to hear lightweight statements from people sitting in responsible positions”, Pradyot added.
On the symbol issue, he said, TIPRA is fighting the elections with the symbol of pineapple taken from Tipraland State Party (TSP) which has merged itself with TIPRA. Since TIPRA is a new party and not registered yet, the party has decided to use TSP’s pineapple as a poll symbol, he added.
On his vision for the TTAADC, he said, “We want electrification of all households, drinking water facilities, pucca houses, roads through various state government and central government schemes”.