Trinamool leading Bengal into financial mess: Buddhadeb

Kolkata: The West Bengal government was leading the state into a financial mess by taking loans three times more than those taken by the previous Left Front government, former chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee today said. “The loans the present government have taken are three times what we had taken. The financial position of the government is not at all good,” Bhattacharjee said during the 46th foundation day of CPI-M mouthpiece Ganashakti in Kolkata. [caption id=“attachment_170448” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“He also criticised the government for hiking salaries of ministers. PTI”]  [/caption] Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had often charged the Left Front government with leading the state to a bankruptcy with a loan burden of around Rs 2 lakh crore. Bhattacharjee, during whose rule Mamata Banerjee had staged the Singur and Nandigram movements to storm to power, said, “The poor landless labourers who had got land rights from our government are now seeing their land snatched by the new dispensation.” Industrialists from outside were realising that the new government had no industrial policy, he said. He also criticised the government for hiking salaries of ministers, saying it had not been done during their rule with the welfare of poor people in mind. “It is unacceptable that the salaries of ministers are raised from Rs 7,000 to Rs 27,000 per month when thousands of transport department retirees are not getting pension,” Bhattacharjee said. Left Front chairman and CPI-M state secretary Biman Bose alleged that the present government in its 225 days of governance was leading the state to anarchy, and claimed that his party was playing the role of a responsible Opposition. “The government has no policy on any matter from industrialisation to education and it seems their policy is to be policyless,” he quipped. PTI