West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday said that the Congress is unnecessarily making an issue out of her Trinamool Congress's decision to contest Assembly polls in other states like Tripura, Goa, and Meghalaya.
Reacting to a Twitter message from senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh accusing Trinamool of poaching in Congress in Goa, Meghalaya, Tripura and other states like that of West Bengal and this serving BJP's objectives, Banerjee said that there no issue in it since her party has not contested in several other states where Congress had contested like Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.
"Sometime, a party needs to contest in multiple states to improve their vote percentage in order to retain or achieve national party status. Will Congress and BJP continue as national parties? Already there had been injustice on Trinamool Congress. We had national party status till 2024. But the Election Commission of India removed that tag before that," the Chief Minister told media persons here.
Commenting on the decision of the protesting wrestlers to immerse their medals in the holy Ganga at Haridwar, she said that her full solidarity is with the wrestlers.
"I cannot just think of such manhandling and assault on those who have brought medals and honours for the country. Even the women wrestlers were not spared," she said.
The Chief Minister said that her government will go for 1.25 lakh fresh recruitments for different departments in the next one year. "The recruitment will be for all departments like education, police and health, among others," she said.
However, the opposition BJP and CPI-M have claimed that the Chief Minister's announcement will never see the light of the day.
On the issue of the Governor House holding back the appointment of the new State Election Commissioner, Banerjee said that the Governor must understand the importance of the situation against the backdrop of the forthcoming panchayat polls.
"I hope that good sense will prevail ultimately," she said.
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