West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has expressed displeasure for not being allowed to speak at the meeting of Prime Minister Narendra Modi with the district magistrates of different States and where some chief ministers were also invited.
A visibly upset Banerjee attacked the Prime Minister calling this meeting a flop show and one-way traffic where she as a Chief Minister was insulted. Interestingly, no other Chief Minister spoke at this meeting, or in the earlier meeting, which was held on May 18, with chief ministers of some other states.
Sources in the government say that the district magistrate of North 24 Parganas was meant to speak at the meeting but he was, however, blocked by the Chief Minister saying that if she was present she would speak.
This is the latest flash in the pan as far as Banerjee and her face-off with Prime Minister Narendra Modi is concerned.
But is it the first time? The answer is certainly no. The last time that Mamata expressed her anger publicly against the Prime Minister was on January 23, this year at the Victoria Memorial where the 125th birth anniversary of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose was being observed.
Objecting to the welcome by slogans of Jai Shri Ram by BJP supporters, Banerjee who was present on the dais with Prime Minister Narendra Modi refused to speak when her turn came in protest saying that shouting such slogans at a government programme was an insult to an elected CM and her position.
Sources in the government say that out of 6 to 8 meetings called by Prime Minister Modi in the last year on Covid, the TMC chief has attended just two. This also includes a meeting that was held amid election campaigning where Mamata had refused to attend a meeting citing election campaign priority.
In December 2014, Banerjee had given a miss to the planning committee meeting called by promising Narendra Modi. Also in July 2015, when the government had called an all-CM meeting to discuss the land acquisition bill issue the Bengal Chief Minister give that a miss.
In 2019, Banerjee skipped the meeting of the Niti Aayog governing body June 2019.
Within a few days of that again in June 2019 when the Prime Minister had called for a meeting of all party presidents to discuss the one country one election issue and to look at the possibility of putting that into practice with the consensus the TMC chief along with DMK chief MK Stalin and TDP chief Chandrababu Naidu had chosen to skip that meeting.
Early this year too in February, Banerjee had skipped the Niti Aayog meeting chaired by the Prime Minister.
Banerjee has been a fiery fighter. She has just been elected as the chief minister of Bengal for the third term in a row. Her utter disdain for the BJP leadership, especially in the backdrop of the bitterly fought Bengal elections, has been out in the open.
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