Subrata Mukherjee rejected Congress for TMC

Kolkata, 4th May : Sparking a spree of speculations, former city mayor and Congress state working president Subrata Mukherjee announced on Tuesday that he will be formally leaving the Congress and joining the Trinamool Congress on Wednesday, ahead of the municipal elections.

However, Mukherjee said he will reveal the reasons behind his decisions on Wednesday.

“I will reveal the reasons for leaving Congress after joining the TMC on Wednesday,” Mukherjee told reporters on Tuesday.

Eyebrows were already being raised in Congress circles at the way Mukherjee was conspicuous by his absence from Saturday’s media conference at the state Congress headquarters where another working president Pradip Bhattacharya announced the names of 88 Congress candidates.

The break-up of the the two parties has definitely weakened the case against the the Communist state government and even among Congress part workers, the dissent is clear about fielding 88 candidates and they feel this will lead to competition against TMC, and not against the CPI(M).

Is Congress CPI(M) agent?

Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee says, “If we have to bow our heads, we will bow before the people. Not before a fly or a CPM agent.”

“Up to 30th May you wait my friend. Congress will prove its substantial presence and support of the people in Bengal and Calcutta,” Bhuniya adds.

Trinamool may just have become the Congress’ bigger enemy than the Left parties. But the Left leaders are skeptical. Biman Bose, chairman of the Left Front in West Bengal, says: “They will try to patch up at local level, on ward basis and that happens.”

The Congress high command is said to have agreed to snap ties with the Trinamool as it wants to test the party’s strength before going all out for the assembly polls.

Senior Congress leader from West Bengal Manas Bhuniya says: “The person and the leaders of the Trinamool Congress who are alleging the Congress as friends of the CPM, they should not forget that their one MP has been increased to 19 MPs with the support of the Congress.”

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Land to the poor

Kolkata: The West Bengal government is planning to distribute for free at least 200,000 acres of state-owned land among underprivileged people in a bid to regain the political support it lost after the forcible acquisition of land for industrial projects.

Gaining favour: A file photo of the Nano unit in Singur that Tata Motors had to abandon. After forcibly acquiring land for various projects, the state government plans to distribute 200,000 acres of land for free. Indranil Bhoumik/Mint

The takeover of some 10,000 acres of farmland had resulted in the Left Front government led by the Communist Party of India (Marxist), or CPM, losing votes in the 2008 village council polls and the 2009 general election, reversing the result of the 2006 assembly polls.

The state government is now trying to make amends by distributing land, both in cities and in rural areas, before the assembly elections scheduled for next year.

A woman & a baby killed in BSF firing

Coochbehar, 4th May: A woman and a baby were killed while three people were critically injured today following firing by the BSF at Balavut border area near Toofanganj in this district, as the security personnel tried to control an unruly mob.

Superintendent of Police, Coochbehar, Kalyan Banerjee told that a woman tried to cross the border fencing near Ghonapara border outpost early this morning in order to take her cattle for grazing when the BSF personnel spotted her and seized her cattle.

An altercation occurred between the security personnel and the woman in which the local villagers also got involved.

To control the irate mob, the BSF personnel first fired in the air. However, the mob attacked the security personnel following which they were compelled to fire at the villagers, killing a six-month-old infant, Asif Sheikh, on the spot.

Four villagers were rushed to Toofanganj subdivisional hospital where one Bochiran Bibi succumbed to her injuries. The condition of the other three was stated to be critical.

A huge contingent of police force was rushed to the area and the higher authorities of the BSF were also reaching the spot, the SP said, adding tension prevailed in the area.

Agreement between Bata & Kolkata

Bata India Ltd (BIL) has restructured its agreements with the Calcutta Metropolitan Group with whom it has set up a joint venture to develop its riverside properties in Batanagar in West Bengal where it has a large factory.

BIL will receive Rs. 100 crore upfront in cash following this recast.

The company said it was doing this to focus on its core business of manufacturing and selling footwear and accessories. It, however, reassured the West Bengal Government that despite the restructuring, it would remain committed to the State government in terms of the approvals given by it towards the project. “BIL’s factory will continue to operate from the site and BIL continues to make additional investments in the factory.” The agreement on restructuring has been entered into on April 28.

BIL had entered into the agreements to develop surplus land at Maheshtala at Batanagar in South 24 Parganas district. The project, on the south-western fringes of the city, on the banks of Hooghly river involved the setting up of an integrated township.

A company release said that the township development and management needed specialized experience, skills and resources and BIL had decided to concentrate on its core business, leaving the responsibility for the development and management of the project to the joint venture partners who were experts in the field.

IGNOU runs a study centre to educate sex workers and their children


Kolkata, 4th May : Taking education to sex workers and prisoners in jail in West Bengal, the Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) has decided to waive fees for them.

“To start with, IGNOU has decided to select the red light district of Sonagachi here from where 26 sex workers are likely to join courses on healthcare and food and nutrition programmes,” IGNOU Vice-Chancellor V N Rajsekharan Pillai said here.

He said that the Kolkata Regional Centre would focus on entrepreneurship development and vocational programmes to help sex workers and their children gain economic independence.

IGNOU runs a study centre to educate sex workers and their children.

It was also providing certificate course to prisoners at the Alipore central jail.

Kasab in Indian judiciary

The judgment was hardly surprising given the accused pleaded guilty during the course of the trial (although he later retracted) and more than 650 witnesses testified against Kasab, backed by video grabs of him walking around the attack site with an AK-47 rifle in hand.

Add to that intense public pressure for awarding the harshest punishment possible and the fact he is from Pakistan, India’s traditional enemy, the verdict was more or less a given.

The speedy trial, hurried by public pressure and overwhelming evidence, is also a victory for India’s notoriously slow judicial system.

The verdict came within a year after court proceedings against Kasab, compared to a 14-year trial in the 1993 serial blasts case in the same city.

Surprisingly, two Indian nationals accused of being members of the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and of conducting reconnaissance in Mumbai before the attack, were acquitted of all charges because the judge felt the evidence against them was weak.

“They might be a big party in Delhi but in West Bengal we are a bigger political party,” – Mamata Banerjee

Kolkata, 2nd May : Trinamool Congress chief and Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee Sunday accused the Congress of acting as agents of the Communist Party.

Acoording to Mamata Banerjee, “We showed a lot of flexibility. But from the beginning they started saying that they will not share seats in Murshidabad and other parts of north Bengal. Just because we are a regional party does not mean we will tolerate insult,”
“We can bow our heads only before the common people of West Bengal. We will not bow our heads in front of agents of CPI-M who are trying to strengthen the CPI-M,” she said while announcing the list of her party candidates for all the 141 Kolkata Municipal Corporation wards here.

When asked whether she will continue in the central government in Delhi, she said: “We will remain in the UPA-2 alliance as long as we get our due respect. It is not a government of the Congress alone. It is an alliance government where we are also partners like the DMK, the NCP and others.

“They might be a big party in Delhi but in West Bengal we are a bigger political party,” she said.

“The last decision will be taken by the people of West Bengal. If someone tries to provide the CPI-M with political oxygen the people of West Bengal will give them the answer,” Banerjee said in a broadside at the Congress, a day after the party announced a list of 88 candidates for the Kolkata Municipal Corporation elections.

Nine killed & eight injured in thundershowers

Kolkata, 3rd May : Lightning strikes killed seven people and injured eight others, while two persons were electrocuted during thundershowers in different parts of the state last night.

Sources today said two persons – identified as Archana Manna (19) and Lakhsmi Kotal (45) – were killed when lightning struck them at Daspur in West Midnapore district, while a student lost his life at Moina in East Midnapore district in a similar incident.

In another incident, lightning struck and killed two persons, who were yet to be identified, at Patrashayar in Bankura district, sources added.

In yet another incident, one minor, identified as Nitai Mandal, lost his life after he was hit by lightning at Trinathpalli in Bidhannagar, while a labourer, Shukdeb Pal (20), was killed in a similar incident at New Town, according to sources.

Meanwhile, two persons were electrocuted to death during thundershowers when the overhead wire fell on them in Joka, it was learnt.

Besides, eight people were wounded after lightning struck them in various parts of the city, source said adding they had been admitted to various healthcare units

Alleged Maoists killed a villager

Jhargram, 3rdMay : The bullet-ridden body of a local rice mill worker was found on a road in Jamda area of Jhargram town this morning, SP, West Midnapore, said.

The fatality, Ram Mandi, accustomed to lecture against Maoist philosophy in the area.

Fourteen to fifteen suspected Maoists broke the door of Mandi’s house last night and took him to a distance and fired four rounds bullet into his body. SP, M K Varma said that the body has been sent for post-mortem.