Kurmi leaders in West Bengal have adopted a two-pronged strategy for the upcoming panchayat polls in the state, with part of it directed towards the ruling Trinamool Congress.

According to senior leader Ashok Mahato, the first part of the strategy is to field independent candidates from the community especially in areas with a substantial number of Kurmi voters.

"First we have decided to field independent candidates from within our community to make all political forces aware of the importance of the people from our community in the electoral system. At the same time, our decision to field our own candidates will help us to highlight our demands in a bigger way," he said.

On the decision of continuing with their call to boycott the Trinamool Congress, Mahato said that following the recent attack on the convoy of Trinamool Congress's national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee, the state administration has unnecessarily blamed the community for the incident.

"Our leaders are under judicial custody. Our demands are simple. Unless the state government releases our leaders and also Cultural Research Institute sends its justification to the Union government about our legitimate demands for the Scheduled Tribe status, there is no question of supporting Trinamool Congress candidates in the panchayat polls," he said.

Meanwhile, Mahato also claimed that their bigger movement in support of these two demands will continue in the coming days as well.

The leaders are concentrating on a massive fund-raising drive in order to meet the legal expenditures on this count. (IANS/NS)