Kolkata: Trinamool Congress (TMC) chief Mamata Banerjee was sworn in as chief minister of West Bengal for the second consecutive term on Friday, in a glittering event.
In attendance were chief ministers of Bihar, Nitish Kumar, Delhi, Arvind Kejriwal, and Uttar Pradesh, Akhilesh Yadav, along with regional bigwigs such as Rashtriya Janata Dal’s (RJD’s) Lalu Prasad Yadav and Farooq Abdullah of the National Conference. Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP’s) minister from Bengal, Babul Supriyo, represented the Centre.
The historic Red Road, which was built by the British during the Second World War to also serve as a runway in times of emergency, bore a look of pageantry as massive paper cut-outs of Banerjee lined the street. A makeshift garden was built and open air air-conditioning was installed on the massive stage to ensure that the guests — which included representatives from the government of Bangladesh and Bhutan and veteran actors like Amitabh Bachchan and Shah Rukh Khan — did not sweat in the humid conditions of Kolkata.
A total of Rs100 million (Dh5.4 million) is estimated to have been spent on the event, attended by 35, 000 people.
Banerjee, 61, took oath of office along with her 41 ministers.
“We will work as per the guidelines of the chief minister,” said Abdur Rezzak Mullah, who was a minister in the erstwhile Left Front government and who has switched sides to join TMC. Similar sentiments were echoed by other ministers including the 17 new faces that make up her team for the second time.
“It is her mandate. We are proud soldiers in her team,” said Aroop Biswas, who was also a minister in Banerjee’s last term. During the election campaign, Banerjee had said that she alone is the real candidate in all the 294 assembly constituencies.
However, in a break from the past, none of the leaders of state opposition, namely Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPM), BJP and the Congress party, attended the ceremony terming it a waste of public money. “It is a complete waste of public money for a state that has been reeling under debt for years. It is like coronation of a queen not a chief minister of the people in a democracy,” said Chandra Bose of the BJP, who contested against Banerjee in the Bhowanipore constituency.
‘Bad call’
BJP state president Dilip Ghosh also expressed his disapproval over the attendance of federal ministers for the ceremony. “Many of our leaders have been injured in political clashes post the election results. Their attendance [Jaitley and Supriyo] sends a wrong signal to the people and hurts the party,” Ghosh said.
Other party leaders — Surjya Kanta Mishra state secretary of the CPM and Adhir Chowdhury, state president of the Congress party — have sounded the war bugle on the first day of the new government, confirming that confrontation will the new mantra of the state opposition which is weak in numbers in the state assembly.
“We will oppose her policies tooth and nail and will take to the streets whenever need[ed],” Chowdhury said. “You cannot show political courtesy when you[r] party workers are being attacked all over the state by the goons of ruling party,” Chowdhury added. However, Ahmad Patel, known to be a confidant of Congress president Sonia Gandhi, attended the ceremony.
