Calcutta, Sept. 5: Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi and the state government tapped several Trinamul Congress leaders to try and bring Mamata Banerjee to the Raj Bhavan talks table today but she stayed put in Singur.
Trinamul sources, however, said a meeting between Mamata and chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee was possible if the talks produced the “desired outcome”.
Sources said the governor had last night requested a senior Trinamul leader to persuade Mamata to join today’s talks. This morning, the government tried to establish contact with Mamata through several of her party leaders, an official in the chief minister’s secretariat said.
“We contacted a front-ranking Trinamul leader today and told him to pass it on to Mamata that we would like to have her at the talks. However, he got back to us in the afternoon saying she wouldn’t be part of today’s meeting,” the official said.
“Perhaps she didn’t want herself to be seen as a failed negotiator,” the official added.
One of the Trinamul leaders contacted was party general secretary Madan Mitra, a senior CPM minister’s aide said. “Our minister called up Madanbabu around noon today. He (Mitra) said it would be difficult to place such a proposal before Mamata. When Madanbabu was contacted a second time, he pleaded helplessness and said his leader was not willing to attend the Raj Bhavan meeting.”
Bhattacharjee had yesterday told Gandhi it would be better if Mamata attended today’s meeting since any decision could be arrived at only “through talks at the highest level’’, an official said.
“The government thought her presence would put an official stamp on the discussions, and any decisions taken. That’s what the chief minister told the governor yesterday, adding he too could turn up in that event if Gandhi so desired,” the official said.
“However, today we talked to two senior Trinamul leaders who told us she wouldn’t attend the Raj Bhavan meeting.”
Trinamul MP and party general secretary Mukul Roy defended Mamata’s decision, saying her presence would have allowed the government to persuade the governor into getting her to consider some “unpleasant proposals’’.
“It has to be kept in mind that our governor is a respected person and Mamatadi always has praise for him. The government knows this and hence could have tried to plead with the governor to persuade her to digest some proposals that may not have been entirely to her liking. So she acted rightly in staying away from today’s meeting,’’ Roy said.
Some Trinamul sources said the Naxalite leaders accompanying Mamata at the Singur dharna had convinced her she should not attend the meeting.
“When we got the message from the government… two Naxalite leaders told her not to go. Their argument was that if she went, people would feel she was ready for a compromise with the government and she would lose credibility. That may have convinced her,” a party leader said.(END) Source: The Telegraph
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