With the third front fast gaining electoral ground, the Congress seems anxious to build bridges with the estranged Left partners by launching a veiled attack against Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee for attempting to block the process of industrialization in West Bengal.
Minister for external affairs Pranab Mukherjee lavished praise on chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee for adopting a `positive approach’ towards industry while lambasting the Trinamool for attempting to block the process by opposing the land acquisition drive undertaken by the West Bengal government
CPM state secretary Biman Bose welcomed the ministerial mumblings by saying: “Though late, the minister has realised the truth and voiced opposition against agitation over acquisition of land for industry.’’
While addressing the Bharat Chamber of Commerce in Kolkata on Saturday, Mukherjee had said political parties should discard their `narrow mindset’ on land acquisition and aid economic development.
The remarks come at a time when several leaders in the state Congress are keen on working out a pre-poll alliance with the Trinamool, which has returned to political centre-stage after it launched anti-acquisition agitations in Nandigram and Singur forcing the Tata’s to shift the Nano project to Gujarat.
Responding to Mukherjees’s remarks Mamata on Sunday stuck to her guns, saying: “What we did was absolutely correct and we will do it again whenever such a situation arises.”
She cautioned that the Trinamool’s keenness to keep the Opposition vote unscathed so as to take on the money muscle and power of the CPM should not be “construed as weakness”.
In a related development, AH Khan Chowdhury, Congress MP from Malda, took serious exception to Mukherjee’s defence of the Left Front government’s industrialisation policy and vowed to take up the issue with the Congress president.
“What Mukherjee has said yesterday was really unfortunate. Our main foe is CPM and not Trinamool. We must work together with Trinamool to oust CPM from West Bengal.”
Till six months ago the Left parties lent crucial support to the Congress-led UPA before the two fell out over the controversial Indo-US civil nuclear agreement.
The CPM and other Left parties have since agreed to desist from any kind of an alliance with the Congress.
The Congress is now looking to stitch up pre-poll arrangements with ‘secular’ allies that obviously cannot side with the third front, which includes the Trinamool, which recently earned vindication for its anti-acquisition stance by thrashing te CPM in a by-poll for the Nandigram assembly constituency.
With a massive onslaught from the Third Front gearing up to smash Congress
Minister for external affairs Pranab Mukherjee lavished praise on chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee for adopting a `positive approach’ towards industry while lambasting the Trinamool for attempting to block the process by opposing the land acquisition drive undertaken by the West Bengal government
CPM state secretary Biman Bose welcomed the ministerial mumblings by saying: “Though late, the minister has realised the truth and voiced opposition against agitation over acquisition of land for industry.’’
While addressing the Bharat Chamber of Commerce in Kolkata on Saturday, Mukherjee had said political parties should discard their `narrow mindset’ on land acquisition and aid economic development.
The remarks come at a time when several leaders in the state Congress are keen on working out a pre-poll alliance with the Trinamool, which has returned to political centre-stage after it launched anti-acquisition agitations in Nandigram and Singur forcing the Tata’s to shift the Nano project to Gujarat.
Responding to Mukherjees’s remarks Mamata on Sunday stuck to her guns, saying: “What we did was absolutely correct and we will do it again whenever such a situation arises.”
She cautioned that the Trinamool’s keenness to keep the Opposition vote unscathed so as to take on the money muscle and power of the CPM should not be “construed as weakness”.
In a related development, AH Khan Chowdhury, Congress MP from Malda, took serious exception to Mukherjee’s defence of the Left Front government’s industrialisation policy and vowed to take up the issue with the Congress president.
“What Mukherjee has said yesterday was really unfortunate. Our main foe is CPM and not Trinamool. We must work together with Trinamool to oust CPM from West Bengal.”
Till six months ago the Left parties lent crucial support to the Congress-led UPA before the two fell out over the controversial Indo-US civil nuclear agreement.
The CPM and other Left parties have since agreed to desist from any kind of an alliance with the Congress.
The Congress is now looking to stitch up pre-poll arrangements with ‘secular’ allies that obviously cannot side with the third front, which includes the Trinamool, which recently earned vindication for its anti-acquisition stance by thrashing te CPM in a by-poll for the Nandigram assembly constituency.
With a massive onslaught from the Third Front gearing up to smash Congress
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