West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar lashed out at the Mamata Banerjee-led government yet again, this time over the State budget which was being tabled in the Assembly at 2:00 pm on Monday. The Governor went on to tweet that his speech was denied live telecast in the media while State Finance Minister Amit Mitra’s speech was telecast live.
“The State Finance Minister Dr. Amit Mitra budget speech was live while the address of the Governor under article 176, an important occasion, in sharp deviation to practice was not allowed live coverage and media was also kept away. Leave to judgement of the people of the State,” read the tweet by the Governor.
The Governor’s rants did not end there. “This is of critical consequence for media. Is this acceptable expression of ideas? Is it not intolerance of the constitutional head? Is it not a kind of censorship? I am sure the media and public would not be just silent spectators,” added the Governor.
Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee hit out at the Governor who has lashed out at the State government on several occasions. While addressing the media soon after the budget was tabled in the Assembly Mamata said, “Instead of playing by the divide and rule policy, the Governor should focus on development.”
On Friday, the Governor chose not to make any changes while reading out the opening speech of the budget which was handed over by the State Government. The speech mentioned that India was gripped by fear and intolerance in the wake of the Citizenship Amendment Act(CAA), National Register of Citizenship(NRC) and National Population Register(NPR).
The Governor who is seen as being in support of the BJP-led Centre had surprised the Trinamool Congress(TMC) by speaking in their tone. The TMC has been protesting against CAA, NRC and NPR along with other political parties that are being vocal on the issue across the nation. While speaking to the media, he went on to say thereafter that he is pro-welfare when it comes to the State and was confident that the TMC government will work in tandem him.
