Agartala, Apr 7 (IANS): Former Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb said on Saturday that the Communists who were in power in Tripura for 25 years cannot even find a candidate to contest the Tripura West Lok Sabha seat.

Deb, the BJP candidate for the Tripura West seat, claimed while addressing an election rally at Anandnagar that the Left had to seek support from arch-rivals Congress to sustain its political existence.

Tripura Congress President Asish Kumar Saha is contesting the Tripura West Lok Sabha seat as the INDIA bloc nominee.

Deb, currently a BJP Rajya Sabha member, also alleged that the Left parties never worked for the welfare of the people, except for their own political gains.

“The CPI-M led Left parties have become desolate after being ousted from power despite ruling Tripura for 25 consecutive years (1993-2018). The Communists have no ideals or principles,” he said.

The BJP leader also asked four-time Tripura Chief Minister and CPI-M politburo member Manik Sarkar to make it clear to the people of the state whether he is in favour of the Congress-Left alliance.

“Why did Sarkar not talk about the alliance publicly? His silence proves that he was against this alliance. For the past few decades, these two political parties (Congress and CPI-M) have fooled the people of the state and staged a drama by levelling charges against each other," Deb said.

Alleging that fear and terror were the only tools used by the Communists to stay in power in Tripura, the BJP leader claimed that even the children and elderly women were not spared from political violence during the Left rule.

He also claimed that no political murder has been reported from Tripura after the BJP government came to power by ousting the Left in 2018.