Kolkata: Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday had visited flood affected areas in South Bengal.
At first, she visited Arambagh where she had served food to the flood affected people. Later addressing the crowd and the media Mamata came down heavily on Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) over alleged harassment on Bengalis at BJP ruled state and mentioned, “With Swami Vivekananda, Ramakrishna Paramahamsa Dev and Maa Sarada, we have a deep-rooted connection. They have shown us the way. To learn about religion, we do not need to go anywhere. Vivekananda once said that leaders would emerge from the grassroots. He made that statement after deep thought. In which language did he speak? Bengali. Remember this!”
Countering the claim of BJP IT cell head Amit Malviya that ‘Bengali is not a language’, West Bengal Chief Minister added, “They (BJP) claim Bengali is not a language. Can the nation exist without Bangla? Our national anthem is in this language. Ramakrishna Paramahamsa Dev said "Sorbo Dharma Somonnoy" and we stand by that. What we have imbibed will not fade. We will carry it with us for life. Do not play with or disrespect our language. Many books have been translated into English for wider understanding, but they were originally written in Bengali.”
After Arambagh, Mamata also visited Ghatal and Midnapore and asked people not to fall in ‘trap’ of the BJP and also urged them to ensure that their names are there in the voter list.
“BJP government neither gives the backlog money to the state and now through SIR the central government is trying to implement NRC through backdoors. Due to the release of water from DVC, Maithon, Panchet, and other dams, both North and South Bengal suffer from floods, which causes immense hardship to people and drains the state treasury. This time, DVC has released 51,000 lakh cubic metres of water. Why hasn’t dredging been done in the last 20 years? We will not tolerate this injustice. After the 2026 Assembly elections, we will plan to stop this forced water release by DVC. We have to create some of our own dams to counter this and manage the floods,” further mentioned Mamata.
