Incidentally, after West Bengal Chief Minister Jyoti Basu announced sometime back that he was keen on calling it a day after serving as CM for 23 years, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) politburo, the party's highest decision-making body, decided a week back that a post of Deputy Chief Minister would be created in the state government and most of Jyoti Basu's functions would be transferred to him.

Bhattacharya, who was already Number 2 in the Cabinet has emerged as a major contender of the post.

``The law and order situation in the state has become worse than what it was when Jyoti Basu himself was in charge of the police,'' Sinha said. ``And Bhattacharya, as Home Minister, is primarily responsible for this (deterioration),'' he added.

The BJP leader also said that what they had been claiming for a long time had now been confirmed by Bhattacharyya who met Union Home Minister L K. Advani in New Delhi day before yesterday to discuss, among other things, the law and order situation in the state. ``Calcutta escapes terrorist attacks because the city is the headquarters of terrorist organisations who do not want disturbances in the city itself for fear of getting exposed,'' Sinha claimed. Sinha also said that his party would sit with the Trinamool Congress in the next week to work out a joint strategy to fight the CPI(M) in the ensuing civic elections in West Bengal.

``The BJP-Trinamool combine is determined to throw the Left Front out of the state by keeping the arrangement intact,'' he said.