Country should strive for installing people’s govt in 2024: Mamata in Bengal Assembly

PTI, Feb 13, 2023, 6:25 PM IST

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday reiterated her call to defeat the BJP in 2024, and said the country should strive for installing ”people’s government to end anarchy”.

Speaking in the Assembly, Banerjee, in an apparent reference to BJP president J P Nadda’s recent remark on violence and corruption in Bengal, asserted that her state happens to have a better law and order situation than other parts of the country.

The CM slammed the Centre for “maintaining silence over the killing of innocent villagers by BSF” in the bordering areas of West Bengal. ”The BSF has unleashed terror in the border areas of West Bengal. Innocent people are being killed in these areas. The Centre never bothers to send a fact-finding team to look into these killings,” she said. Hitting out at the BJP for “letting loose a malicious campaign” against the TMC by trying to project the entire party and the government as “corrupt”, Banerjee said people will teach the party a lesson.

”The BJP is behaving as if it is the only party of honest leaders and ours is a party of thieves. The saffron party is like a washing machine. A tainted person becomes a saint after joining the BJP,” she said. ”They are arresting our people for coal scam, but why is no action being taken against the custodian of the coal mines and the officials of the Centre-owned Coal India and ECL,” she questioned.

Mocking the Centre’s notification asking people to hug a cow on Valentine’s Day, which was later withdrawn, Banerjee wondered what would happen if the cow hits the person. ”If the cow hits us, what will happen? Will they (BJP) pay us compensation? They should first approve a compensation of Rs 10 lakh for those who might get hurt after being hit by the cow,” she added.