Railway minister Mamata Banerjee’s attempts to grab all the brownie points from the Left Front government in West Bengal have brought her into a direct conflict with her cabinet colleagues in Delhi.
A prime example is her tug of war with urban development minister S Jaipal Reddy over the East-West Metro project in Kolkata, which Banerjee says should be transferred to the railway ministry.
The Rs4,876-crore project sanctioned by the Centre under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) proposes to link central Kolkata to its suburbs. The metro system is a 13.77-km stretch of underground and elevated tracks from Salt Lake to Howrah. Spanning 900 mt it would go 32 mt below the surface of the Hoogly river.
“As soon as Mamata took over as railway minister she asked Jaipal Reddy for details on the project,” an urban development ministry source said.
Mamata argued the state government would not be able to handle “sensitive issues” related to the project. However, this claim appears hollow considering 53 out 56 acres of land needed for the project belongs to the government. From the remaining three acres of land a little over 400 people would be displaced, the source said.
Taking over the one of a kind project has become a prestige issue for both the Left Front and the Trinamool Congress. It’s left to see whether Mamata’s political compulsions will overrule that of her cabinet colleague.
