Mamata-Modi meeting not solely for Bengal’s development: Congress

Kolkata, May 29 (IANS) Criticising West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for not approaching the Centre for the state development when necessary, the state Congress leadership on Monday claimed that her recent meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi was not solely for Bengal's sake.

"Any Chief Minister can meet the Prime Minister. But I refuse to believe that her meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi was solely for the sake of Bengal's development," state Congress chief Adhir Chowdhury told reporters.

"If Banerjee was so concerned about the development of Bengal she should have attended the Niti Aayog and the Inter-State Council meetings. She should have also gone to Delhi before the budget session to ask for better budgetary allocations for the state but she hasn't," he claimed.

Referring to Banerjee's meeting with Congress President Sonia Gandhi, Chowdhury claimed that there is no discord between the party's state and central leadership.

"There is no discord between the central and state leadership of Congress. It is a separate issue who is talking to who in Delhi. The meeting does not mean that we cannot talk against Mamata Banerjee in Bengal," he claimed.

The Congress leader said that it is not just Banerjee but 17 opposition parties have come together recently to discuss about a favourable candidate in the upcoming presidential elections.

"The fight within Bengal's political premises is a separate issue from the dialogues between the two parties at the centre," he said.

Chowdhury also announced that the state Congress would organise a protest rally in the city against the policies of the central and the state government on July 12, terming the state government's claims of several achievements in the last one year as "immaterial and hollow".