News Analysis India

Tag: Mamata Banerjee

  • Making arrangements for free COVID vaccine for everyone in Bengal, says CM Mamata Banerjee

    By PTI
    KOLKATA: The West Bengal government is making arrangements to provide free COVID vaccines to all the people of the state, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has said.

    In an open letter, Banerjee said the COVID warriors, including police, home guards, civil defence volunteers, correctional home and disaster management employees, will be administered the vaccine on a priority basis.

    “I am happy to inform that our government is making arrangements for reaching the vaccine to all people of the state free of any charge,” the chief minister said in the letter addressed to the frontline workers.

    Banerjee expressed her gratitude to all the COVID warriors for their selfless service to the people of West Bengal.

    India is set to launch its COVID-19 vaccination drive from January 16 with priority to be given to nearly three crore healthcare and frontline workers across the country.

    The chief minister’s announcement of free vaccination for everyone comes months ahead of the assembly elections, which are likely to be held in April-May.

    Earlier, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan had made a similar announcement.

    The southern state will also go to polls along with Bengal.

    The Bihar government has also given the cabinet nod to provide free vaccine to every citizen of the state, a promise the BJP made in its manifesto for the assembly elections held in October-November.

  • After Mamata Banerjee hints at implementing PM Kisan scheme, BJP promises to pay farmers arrears

    By PTI
    NANDIGRAM: BJP national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya on Friday said that the saffron party, after voted to power in West Bengal, will ensure that each farmer of the state will get Rs 18,000 in arrears under the PM Kisan scheme.

    The assertion of Vijayvargiya, the BJP’s West Bengal in-charge, came days after Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee indicated that she was agreeable to implement the central scheme in the state, under which farmers get Rs 6,000 a year in three equal installments.

    The move of the Trinamool Congress supremo, made months before the assembly election, is being seen as an attempt to blunt the BJP’s accusation that her party is preventing farmers of the state from getting benefits of the scheme.

    “Farmers of Bengal will get their due after the Mamata Banerjee government goes and the BJP government comes to power,” Vijayvargiya said, while addressing a party rally at Nandigram in Purba Medinipur district.

    They will be paid Rs 18,000 each in arrears, the amount which has already been transferred to the bank accounts of farmers in the rest of the country, he said.

    The mafia controls coal and sand mining in the state and indulges in cattle smuggling, he alleged, asserting that those involved in such rackets will be driven out of the state by the BJP.

    Describing the TMC as a virus, the BJP’s West Bengal president Dilip Ghosh who also addressed the rally, said that his own party is its vaccine which will make the ruling party leave the state after May.

    The assembly election in the state is due in April- May.

    Claiming that the BJP already has 1.5 crore members in West Bengal, Ghosh said that nearly 29,000 cases have been filed against BJP workers in the state to intimidate them.

    “The previous Left Front and the current TMC dispensation failed to deliver. The BJP will ensure that the state marches ahead in the path of development,” he said.

    Ghosh alleged that the money meant for relief after cyclone Amphan has been looted and misappropriated by TMC workers and leaders.

    “The parivartan (change) people had hoped for after the TMC came to power proved a mirage and now there’s the need for another parivartan,” he said.

    Ministers and leaders of the TMC are leaving the party as they are not getting due respect and position, the BJP state president claimed.

    “Mamata Banerjee is now accusing us of breaking her party. What had she done to other parties earlier in the state?” he asked, claiming that the TMC had made several MLAs of the Congress and Left parties join the party.

    Holding that the anti-land acquisition movement of the TMC at Singur, which led to the shifting of Tata Motors’ Nano car plant to Gujarat, was “wrong”, BJP national vice president Mukul Roy said that West Bengal did not get any industry since the company was forced to leave.

    “If we win the elections, we will urge the prime minister to get the Tatas back in Singur for the sake of rejuvenation of industry in the state,” said Roy who was in the TMC during the movement at Singur.

    He, however, said that Nandigram agitation was a different issue since the Left Front government had forcibly taken away land from poor farmers, and Suvendu Adhikari led that movement of the people.

    Adhikari, who recently resigned as the TMC MLA of Nandigram and joined the BJP, alleged that stones were thrown during the meeting to create chaos and disturbance.

    “Even the CPI(M) during its rule had not done any such thing when the TMC held meetings,” Adhikari said.

    He thanked BJP leaders L K Advani, Rajnath Singh and the late Sushma Swaraj for their support to the Nandigram movement in 2007 against the Left Front governments move to acquire farmlands for setting up a special economic zone (SEZ).

  • Industrialists originally hailing from outside integral part of Bengal: CM Mamata Banerjee

    Most of those who spoke at the meet highlighted the positive changes that happened in Bengal, an industrialist said.

  • Eastern India Motion Picture Association appeals Mamata Banerjee to resume cinema shows with full occupancy

    By ANI
    KOLKATA: The Eastern India Motion Picture Association through an official letter appealed to the West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee to resume cinema theatres with 100 percent occupancy.

    Cinema halls in the state are currently running at 50 per cent of their occupancy in view of the coronavirus crisis in the country.

    In the letter to the CM on Tuesday, the President of the association, Piya Sengupta stated that the current practice of film screenings is causing a “huge financial crisis,” to the cinema hall owners.

    “Madam, during the last phase of unlock your Government, has allowed the cinema hall owners to operate their business from 15 October, 2020 with 50 per cent occupancy to maintain the rules and protocols to combat the spread of the disease for the safety of health of cine-goers,” Sengupta wrote.

    “The necessary SOP issued by the authority to run the cinema shows was appropriately followed. The cinema hall owners however sustained a huge financial crisis by way of such compliance with the Government directives on limited occupancy as narrated herein,” she added.

    The association also cited a recent notification by the Tamil Nadu government wherein, the government increased the sitting capacity of cinemas from the existing 50 percent to 100 percent.

    Sengupta stated how Bengali and Hindi films in the pipeline are not being released leading to financial loss to cinema hall owners.

    “The cinema hall owners are suffering huge losses as no new banner Bengali/Hindi hints are releasing due to the occupancy restrictions,” the letter read.

    “If the occupancy of cine-goers is relaxed several Bengali/Hindi films waiting in the pipeline will be released and the exhibitors may be benefited and will be able to get a chance to survive,” Sengupta wrote in the letter.

    The letter ended with the association assuring that there have been no reports of the spread of the coronavirus through the way of screening of films in cinema halls in the country.

  • Will convene Assembly against farm laws: Mamata Banerjee

    By Express News Service
    KOLKATA: Continuing her tirade against the Centre over the new farm laws, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday said arrangements would soon be made to convene an assembly session to pass a resolution against the contentious legislations.

    With assembly polls knocking at the door, Banerjee also hinted that she was ready to implement the PM-Kisan scheme in Bengal, and said she had asked the Centre to share details of all those who have registered themselves on the Union government’s portal for the programme.

    Banerjee, however, asserted that said she would never allow the implementation of the three farm laws, which have sparked protests across the country.

    “We are against those farm laws. We would soon convene an assembly session for a day or two and pass a resolution against the anti-farmer laws,” Banerjee said.

    Bengal, if it passes the resolution, would become the sixth state in the country to do so, after Kerala, Delhi, Punjab, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan.

    The CM’s remarks came on a day when the seventh round of talks between protesting unions and three central ministers ended inconclusively, as farmer groups stuck to their demand for repeal of the three farm laws, while the government listed out various benefits of the new Acts for the growth of the country’s agriculture sector. “I support the farmers and want the withdrawal of these three laws for the sake of the country,” she said.

  • West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee criticises BJP for abolishing Planning Commission

    By PTI
    KOLKATA: Hitting out at the BJP-led government at the Centre for abolishing the Planning Commission conceptualised by Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday said that her government would come up with a similar body to take forward the nationalistic leader’s ideas and vision.

    She urged Nobel laureate economists Amartya Sen and Abhijit Banerjee and Bose’s grandnephew Sugata Bose, a historian and former Trinamool Congress MP, to advise the state government on this.

    “The Planning Commission has been dissolved by the central government. They have named the new body (which replaced the Planning Commission) Niti Aayog or Niti Niyog, I do not know. It does not have any ideology, nor any method (to work). Earlier, I used to go for meetings of the Planning Commission which sought suggestions from each state. Now we cannot share our views,” Banerjee said.

    The Narendra Modi government disbanded the Planning Commission in 2014 and had formed the Niti Aayog.

    “We will start a Bengal Planning Commission to take Netaji’s vision to the world level,” Banerjee told reporters after a meeting of a committee set up by the TMC government to plan year-long celebrations to mark the 125th birth anniversary of the freedom fighter.

    She also demanded that Netaji’s birthday on January 23 be declared a national holiday.

    The CM also stressed on her demand that the Centre declassify all the files on Netaji.

    “We have already done it (declassified some files). We are demanding that the Centre declassify all files related to Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose,” she said.

    Abhijit Banerjee and other members of the committee attended the virtual meeting.

    Netaji’s birthday on January 23 will be celebrated as ‘Desh Nayak Divas’ in West Bengal, Banerjee said adding that a ‘Azad Hind Fauj’ monument will be soon erected in Rajarhat area of Kolkata.

    The chief minister also proposed forming a ‘Jai Hind Bahini’ along the lines of the National Cadet Corps in state-run schools and colleges in memory of Netaji.

    Elaborating on it, she said the Jai Hind Bahini will be like the government’s flagship ‘Kanyashree’ project.

    Those who join it will get priority in getting scholarships and will be trained by the government.

    “We will be investing the money for the future generation. The colleges and university and the education department will take the initiative to provide fellowships to those in the Bahini,” she said.

    She advocated a short film or a documentary on Netaji for schoolchildren.

    Besides, a CD of songs related to Netaji will also be brought out, she said adding the state government will set up a ‘national university’ named after Netaji.

    “We will set up a national university without taking help from anybody. This university will have links to world class universities like Havard, Cambridge and Oxford,” she announced.

    The chief minister said that on Netaji’s birthday a rally will be organised from Shyambazar in north Kolkata to Red Road in the central part of the city.

    A tableaux on the life of Netaji will be taken out dring the Republic Day parade here on January 26, while during this year’s Independence Day rally will be themed on the nationalistic leader.

    Others who took part in the virtual meeting were the famed painter Suvaprasanna, theatre personality Rudra Prasad Sengupta, author Sirsendhu Mukherjee, actor and danseuse Mamata Shankar.

  • Country is plagued with misogynists from BJP: TMC on Vijayvargiya’s tweet against Mamata

    By PTI
    KOLKATA: Women leaders of the Trinamool Congress have slammed BJP national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya, accusing him of posting a misogynistic tweet against West Bengal Chief Minister and party supremo Mamata Banerjee.

    Vijayvargiya, also the saffron party’s Bengal minder, shared a photo of Banerjee, in which she is seen cooking in a tribal village, on Twitter and, in an accompanying statement, said in Hindi, “Didi has already started doing the work she will have to do after 5 months.” 

    Banerjee’s photo was taken at Ballavpur village where she had stopped for some time while returning to Kolkata from Birbhum district last week.

    The assembly election in the state is due in April-May this year.

    Reacting sharply to Vijayvargiya’s post, TMC MP Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar claimed that the country is filled with misogynists from the BJP who think the place of a woman is in the kitchen.

    “If you are a woman and you have aspirations to join active politics, remember – our country is plagued with MISOGYNISTS from BJP like these who plan to send women back to the kitchen,” Ghosh Dastidar tweeted.

    “Can’t imagine the lack of respect that women in Kailash Vijayvargiya family must be facing,” the doctor turned politician said.

    West Bengal minister Shashi Panja said, “BJP shows their true colors again! This is what they think of the only sitting female CM in India. No wonder our women are not safe under their rule! Before your misogyny strikes again, remind yourselves of the Chaiwala who’s now your boss!”

    Actor turned party MP Nusrat Jahan said “Shri Kailash Vijayvargiya’s comments are OUTRIGHT MISOGYNISTIC! BJP crossed the mark by insulting every single woman who cooks, provides for families and has aspirations. Mamata Banerjee is the only female CM in India at present and once again, BJP targets and abuses her. #Shameful.” 

    BJP Mahila Morcha state president Agnimitra Paul, however, wondered how that tweet of Vijayvargiya could be misogynistic.

    “Cooking cannot be a demeaning job. Our mothers and grandmothers cooked for days to sustain the family. Millions of women – working or housewives – cook with passion for their near ones every day. There are thousands of male chefs who are proud of their work. How can the tweet be demeaning or misogynistic?” she told PTI.

    Paul, also a fashion designer, claimed that at a meeting in the past, TMC MP Abhisek Banerjee had asked the crowd if they will wear sari and bangle if attacked.

    “Isn’t that demeaning to Indian women? Wearing sari and bangle is the pride of Indian women. What would the TMC women MPs have to say about that?” Paul asked.

    Mamata Banerjee made a sudden detour and entered the tribal village while returning to Kolkata after wrapping up a two-day visit to Bolpur in Birbhum district on December 30.

    She joined tribal women and cooked vegetables during the surprise visit to the village.

    Vijayvargiya on that day had said the chief minister’s sudden visit to the village was nothing but a “drama”.

    His alleged misogynistic tweet was posted on the next day.