Any anti-social act even if by TMC men won’t be tolerated: Mamata Banerjee

“As long as I am alive and my government is there, I will not allow division of people based on religious lines,” she said adding her government has driven home the message that any crime will be dealt with strictly according to the law. “If any Trinamool man is involved in any crime, he will not be let off. Action against so many Trinamool supporters had been taken…the Left Front never did that,” she added.

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Earlier, as she rose to speak, the Left Front MLAs walked out of House protesting against the deteriorating law and order situation in the state. To this, Mamata said, “You have raised so many issues of law and order, you should have the political decency to listen to my replies. Every year you raise baseless allegations and then walk out of the House as I rise to reply your charges.”

At the same time she also pointed to the “poor quality” of the debate and said the Opposition did not have any substantial point to attack the government. “If there is constructive criticism I welcome it, and am ready to accept any suggestion,” she added.

Taking part in the debate earlier, the Congress and the Left MLAs attacked the government mostly on incidents on rape and other crimes against women. CPM’s Anisur Rahaman and Congress’s Manoj Chakraborty also raised the issue of bomb-making factories  in Khagragarh and Pingla that were running under the patronage of local Trinamool leaders.

Shamik Bhattacharya of BJP alleged that the district magistrates were functioning like the sabhapatis of the ruling party.

The house witnessed uproarious scenes when TMC’s Sovandeb Chattopadhyay, speaking on the police budget, pointed at the CPM benches and said: “It is a pity people like “Kankal (skeleton) Ghosh” are sitting in this House”.

Chattopadhyay was hinting at Sushanta Ghosh, the CPM MLA from Garbeta who was alleged to have engineered many political murders. Soon after the Trinamool government took charge, a number of skeletons were recovered from near his ancestral house.

He was also arrested in connection with the recovery and a case is still sub-judice.

Replying to the debate on the police budget in the Assembly, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee claimed to have taken up a huge initiative to modernise the state police.

She said unlike during the Left Front  regime when funds marked for utilisation used to lapse, her government was ensuring its maximum utilisation.

She said her government has installed 600 CCTVs at strategic locations in Kolkata. As many as 77 new police stations are coming up, 35 of them women police stations. Eight women police stations are already operational.

Eight coastal police stations are also coming up while an equal number of cyber police stations have been set up. She said, her government, in the past four years, has set up five police commissionerates.