Team News Riveting
Kolkata, June 1
The rift between the Centre and the state of West Bengal had been plunging to new lows as days passed with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee coming out with the defence that New Delhi defy.
Defending her act of keeping the establishment protocol at bay and skipping Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s review meeting to assess the damage caused by Cyclone Yaas, Mamata Banerjee said she was informed late about the PM’s program and meeting. She cut short her schedule for the PM’s program.
Ironically, meeting to review nature’s fury could not be fixed well in advance. The same timelines were followed when the Prime Minister visited the state last year after Cyclone Amphan devastation. After Yaas hit, both Odisha and West Bengal were informed at a similar time. However Odisha managed the program very well where the Prime Minister landed first.
Sources in the Government of India said that the West Bengal Chief Minister did not want to attend the meeting and hence the lame excuses were put forward. A senior official said she was prepared to attend the meeting but dropped in frustration when was informed that Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari was also invited.
If the Chief Minister could manage time for a meeting after Amphan then what went wrong for Yaas. In the given situation, her rescheduling programme for an hour was quite possible as the Prime Minister was not there to stay for the day in Kalaikunda airbase.
Mamata Banerjee was trying to put the ball on the Prime Minister’s court by claiming that he permitted her to skip the meeting for which he had come, leaving other businesses on hold. The Prime Minister office had also not confirmed that the West Bengal Chief Minister was granted permission to skip the meeting.
A senior bureaucrat explained it well: Had it been true, the Chief Minister would have left her Chief Secretary or other senior state officials to represent the state.
