‘Mamata Banerjee lied’: Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury reacts to NITI meeting charge

Reacting to Mamata Banerjee’s allegation that her mic was turned off during the NITI Aayog’s meeting, West Bengal Congress chief Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury claimed the chief minister was lying.

“The things that Mamata Banerjee is saying regarding the NITI Aayog meeting, I feel like she is lying. It is very surprising if a state’s CM wouldn’t be allowed to speak. Mamata Banerjee knew what would be happening there. she had the script,” he said.

His views on the matter were different than those of his party, the Congress, which said the treatment meted out to Banerjee was unacceptable.

Chowdhury, who lost the recent Lok Sabha polls to TMC’s Yusuf Pathan, is one of the most vocal critics of Mamata Banerjee. Ahead of the polls, he launched several scathing attacks on Banerjee.

The Trinamool Congress later blamed Chowdhury for its decision to contest the general elections alone. The party won 29 seats in Bengal.

Earlier on Saturday, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury wrote to President Droupadi Murmu, alleging that West Bengal was in an “anarchic condition” and sought her intervention to “restore law and order” in the state.

“I wish to seek your kind intervention in restoring civility and law and order in public life in West Bengal. For me, at a personal level, it is not only disturbing but also deeply anguishing to see the anarchic condition in the state owing to the ruthless approach of the ruling party on the workers, sympathisers, and supporters of the opposition,” Chowdhury wrote in the two-page letter.

“There are also several cases of people not affiliated to the ruling party and inclined favourably to the opposition parties in the state have lost their jobs or means of livelihood because of the strongarm tactics of ruling dispensation in the state,” he added.

Mamata Banerjee on Saturday claimed the chief ministers of BJP-ruled states were given more time to speak but her mic was turned out after five minutes. Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman refuted the allegations.

The Congress later targeted the NITI Aayog, saying it had functioned as a “drumbeater” of Prime Minister Narendra Modi since its inception.

“Since it was established ten years ago, NITI Aayog has been an attached office of the PMO and has functioned as a drumbeater for the non-biological PM. Its functioning has been blatantly partisan, and it is anything but professional and independent,” said Jairam Ramesh.