'I call you Didi, your slap is a blessing for me': PM Modi to Mamata

Purulia: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday hit back at West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and said that her "slap" will be a blessing for him.

"I have been told that here Didi has said that she wants to slap Modi. Mamata Didi I call you 'Didi', respect you. Your slap will become a blessing for me. I am ready to take that)," Prime Minister Modi said while addressing a rally here.

"But I will also say that you won't feel scared if you would have dared to slap those who, in the name of chit fund, looted the money of poor people," he added.

Mamata Banerjee had on Tuesday accused Prime Minister Modi of lying and said when he attacked her party of being a "tolabaaz" (toll collector), she wanted to give him a "tight slap of democracy."

Speaking at the rally on Thursday, Modi gave an assurance that the "infiltrators that 'Didi' and TMC have made their cadres will be identified. Those who trouble our daughters and the cultured Bengalis here, they will be identified."

"Not enough days are left for those, who have turned 'Gantantra' (republic) into 'Gundatantra' in West Bengal," he said.

Earlier in the day on Thursday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is insulting the Constitution by saying that she is not ready to accept him as the Prime Minister of the country.

Addressing a rally in West Bengal's Bankura here, Modi said "Didi (Banerjee) is publicly saying that she is not ready to accept the country's PM as the head of the nation, but she feels proud in acknowleding Pakistan PM as that country's prime minister." He said Banerjee was insulting the Constitution out of anxiety of losing the general elections. The prime minister had tried to contact the chief minister to discuss cyclone Fani but could not do so as his calls were not returned.

Banerjee had said in a rally that she does not accept Narendra Modi as the prime minister of the country describing him as the "expiry PM" and that she will talk to the new prime minister after the election results. "She did not take calls from me during the cyclone. The Central government wanted to sit with officers of the state to discuss the situation, but Didi did not allow that too," Modi said at the rally here. "She is not interested in the betterment of the state, but in that of her family, nephew and tolabaj (extortionists) of her party," the PM said.

Modi said that how much the TMC supremo is worried can be understood by the language being used by her. "She is now talking about stones and slaps against me," the PM said. "I am used to abuses, I have now got the ability to digest abuses from dictionaries from around the world," he said.