Trinamool moves spl notice in Assembly over ‘gagging’ of CM

Kolkata: The Trinamool Congress (TMC) on Monday moved a special notice in the Bengal legislative assembly condemning the ‘switching off’ of Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s microphone in the Niti Aayog meeting in New Delhi on July 27 when she was speaking on behalf of the state.

Minister Manas Bhunia, in charge of the state Water Resources Investigation and Development department, moved the notice stating it was a matter of serious concern. He maintained that such act was against the spirit of cooperative federalism and claimed that the House was anguished over the treatment meted out to the CM during the course of the Niti Aayog meeting.

“The Chief Minister was speaking in the greater interest of the people of our state. She was the only Chief Minister from the Opposition who attended the meeting but she was not allowed to speak and her microphone was deliberately switched off in an attempt to stifle the Opposition point of view. It was a calculated humiliation meted out to the Chief Minister of our state,” said Bhunia. State Finance minister Chandrima Bhattacharya said that the CM’s humiliation was tantamount to humiliation of the state. “Chief Ministers of BJP-ruled states were allowed to speak for 14-20 minutes. However, our Chief Minister’s microphone was stopped in less than 5 minutes violating co-operative federalism. The way the union Finance minister spoke using unconstitutional language over the incident should be condemned and that should be from this House,” she added.

BJP legislator Shankar Ghosh, the Opposition Chief Whip, opposing the notice, said that whatever Banerjee had said to reporters after coming out of the meeting cannot be officially discussed in the assembly. He claimed whatever Banerjee said was not official as she spoke outside the official meeting of Niti Aayog.

Speaker Biman Banerjee, who had suspended the question hour session of the assembly to facilitate discussion on the special notice, said that it was absolutely proper to allow discussion on the issue. “The Chief Minister is the leader of the House (state assembly) and she had gone to the Niti Aayog meeting to discharge her Constitutional duties. Whatever the Chief Minister said was in the interest of West Bengal. So, if she was stopped from speaking, there should be a protest.”

The BJP staged a walkout in protest against the Speaker’s statement and shouted slogans outside the House.

State Urban Development and Municipal Affairs minister Firhad Hakim said, “Our state has trusted in Mamata Banerjee and rejected Narendra Modi who had campaigned in Bengal several times before the elections. So it is natural that she would not be allowed to speak. The BJP is frightened to hear the truth as the Centre wants that our country should be just for the corporates. Mamata had raised her voice for the common people and so she was stopped. The BJP walked out because they too believe that Bengal has been deprived”.

Trinamool Congress legislators Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay, Aroop Biswas, Udayan Guha also condemned the matter, speaking in favour of the special notice.