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Bengal

State writes to Centre, TMC protests outside Raj Bhavan

State Chief Secretary Basudeb Bandopadhyay on Friday wrote a letter to the Union Cabinet Secretary stating that it was unprecedented to deploy Army by the Centre without the approval of the state government, state Parliamentary Affairs minister Partha Chatterjee said on Friday.

“It is unprecedented that Army was deployed without the consent of the state government. The Army was deployed in 18 places. In North Bengal, Army was deployed. It may be a routine exercise but permission of the state government is required. The Narendra Modi government is destroying the federal structure of the country,” he said.

He said the Defence minister Manohar Parrikar and Ananth Kumar, minister for Chemicals and Fertilisers have made statements in the Parliament supporting the deployment of Army in Bengal on Thursday. “But their statements did not contain any statistical data on their deployment in other states. Army was not deployed in Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. It is unfortunate that the ministers are making statements that are far from reality.” He said the state’s permission was always required before deployment of the personnel of the armed forces.

Attacking Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Chatterjee said he was using the Army to settle political vendetta. “We have great respect for the Army who are protecting the country but Modi is using them for political purpose. This is most unfortunate and did not happen in our country before. Because of his arrogance he has ruined all the institutions in the country and is affecting the federal structure.”

Trinamool Congress legislators staged a dharna outside Raj Bhavan to protest against the deployment of Army by the Centre. Governor K N Tripathi is away in Delhi.

The legislators will meet him on Saturday to discuss the matter. Chatterjee said that the Modi government often tends to forget that there is an elected government in Bengal and it had come to power with overwhelming majority.

Even in the by-election, TMC did exceptionally well. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has raised her voice against demonetisation and has organized a movement against the draconian decision. The ordeal of the people is increasing every day.

“The incident of the airport fiasco where the aircraft in which she was travelling was not allowed to land at Dum Dum airport though the pilot had informed the ATC that the plane was running on low fuel or deployment of Army everywhere is examples of Modi government trying to flex muscles to scare us. But they are making a big mistake. Such tactics will not have any impact,” he remarked.
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