Mamata Banerjee: Opposition is jealous of us, doing drama

Lashing out against the Opposition, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday said that they engineered the Narada sting operation because they did not have any other issue to counter her party in the run-up to the Assembly election.

“At the time of the election, by offering money you have tried to stage a drama,” she said.

Ms Banerjee claimed that the Opposition Congress, CPI(M) and BJP were jealous of the large-scale development that had taken place in the state during her five-year rule. “We ran the government for five years and there was not a single complaint of corruption against us. Now at the time of the election they are doing natak (drama),” she said. Ms Banerjee on Friday addressed three election rallies in Howrah district at Bally, Salkia and Howrah North.

The Narada sting video was released on March 14 and in the past five week, Ms Banerjee and her Trinamul Congress party have been frequently changing their stand on the issue which has clearly pushed them on the backfoot. Ms Banerjee attacked the CPI(M), BJP and Congress for calling the Trinamul Congress “thief” while they themselves were bigger thieves. “The mother of thieves shouts the most,” she said, translating a Bengali proverb. She then went on to read out from a sheet of paper. “Those who are calling us thief answer this. The BJP has received Rs 2,200 crore from unknown sources and the Congress Rs 2,100 crore from unknown sources,” she said.

However, later she admitted that in a political party there could a black sheep or two. “One or two people may be bad but we keep them under check. It does not mean that you can say that the party which I had founded is a bad party,” she added.

Lashing out against Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Ms Banerjee said that he merely made tall claims.