New Delhi:
The turf war between the Centre and the West Bengal state government seems to intensify with each passing day. Now, to add to this simmering tension, a minister in the new Narendra Modi government has issued a warning to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. "If the state government tries to hamper our flow of work, people of Bengal will remove those impediments" Union Minister Debasree Chowdhuri was quoted as saying by IANS. Chowdhuri said this as she assumed the charge of the Women and Child Development Ministry in New Delhi on Friday. Chaudhuri had defeated Trinamool’s Kanaialal Agarwal by 60,574 votes in Raiganj, which was once a bastion of the Congress. The BJP, which won 18 seats in the eastern state in the just-concluded Lok Sabha elections, has said that the Mamata Banerjee government will not survive till 2021.
Sushri Debasree Chaudhuri takes charge as the MoS for @MinistryWCD, in New Delhi pic.twitter.com/fWKwVS0095
— PIB India (@PIB_India) May 31, 2019
"I want to work on the basis of mutual understanding with the state government. The work should be done in Bengal the way work is done across the country," Chowdhuri added. The comments come as Banerjee continues to maintain a firm distance from the Centre. Banerjee had turned down the invite for Modi’s swearing-in ceremony saying, “The oath-taking ceremony is an august occasion to celebrate democracy, not one that should be devalued by any political party.â€
On Thursday, the chief minister had lost her cool when some men shouted 'Jai Shri Ram' as her motorcade passed through Bhatpara area of North 24 Parganas district. The video clips showing her getting off her car and scolding the unidentified men in the group have gone viral. "What do you think of yourself? You will come from other states, stay here and abuse us? I will not tolerate this. How dare you all abuse me? All of your names and details will be noted down," she could be heard saying in the video.
After she got back into her car, the men again chanted "Jai Shri Ram", prompting her to disembark from the vehicle once more. Threatening her rivals, the Chief Minister even improvised an iconic Mithun Chakraborty dialogue from movie ‘MLA Fatakeshto’ and said, “I know all of them. I am challenging you all. Do you remember the dialogue of Mithun Chakraborty? 'marbo ekhane.. laash porbe... (Will thrash you here, corpse will fall) no I cannot talk about corpse, I will say 'marbo ekhane ... bichar hobe okhane ( I will thrash you here and you will get justice there).â€
BJP state president Dilip Ghosh said the more Trinamool Congress chief protests against the chant the more public support she would lose in the state.Â
