Former Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi said on Wednesday that the incumbent Congress’ chances of winning the Tripura Assembly elections looked bleak, but there was no reason why the party should not “put up a fight”, The Indian Express reported. The Tripura polls will be held on February 18, and the results will be declared on March 3.

“The Bharatiya Janata Party has gained ground [in Tripura] because they are ruling at the Centre,” Gogoi said at a press conference in Agartala. “This always makes it easy in such a small state. Besides they are pumping in money in the elections. Look at the number of aircraft, choppers, vehicles they are using in Tripura alone.”

The Congress leader claimed that the BJP was using the black money it claimed to have recovered through demonetisation to fund the election campaign. He also alleged that the BJP had received money from corporate firms.

“I can tell you from the Assam experience that the BJP is the most politically corrupt party that the country has ever seen,” Gogoi claimed. Citing the example of Himanta Biswa Sarma, who joined the saffron party in 2015, Gogoi said that to the BJP, politicians are corrupt before they join it and saintly afterwards.

The former Assam chief minister also said that the BJP had promised to create a separate state of Bodoland in Assam, as well as to provide jobs for teachers, but had failed to fulfill these promises.

Asked about the alliance between the ruling Congress and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) in Tripura, the former Assam chief minister said, “This is important at a time when the BJP has created so much polarisation, divisiveness and tension in the country. It becomes important at such a time to form a secular alliance with whomsoever wants to join.”