Mamata cancels Delhi trip, to skip meeting on 'One Nation, One Election'

Kolkata: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee announced on Monday that she has cancelled her proposed trip to Delhi to attend a crucial meeting on 'One Nation, One Election'.

As per the original schedule, the Chief Minister was supposed to leave for Delhi on Monday evening to attend the meeting on Tuesday, and return to Kolkata on the same night.

However, she said on Monday that since the budget session of the state Assembly is presently underway, her presence in the House is important and hence she has decided to cancel her trip.

Instead, she said, Trinamool Congress Lok Sabha members Sudip Bandopadhyay and Kalyan Banerjee will represent the party at the meeting on 'One Nation, One Election'.

Speculation had been rife over the Chief Minister’s proposed Delhi visit for quite some time, with rumours doing the rounds that attending the meeting on 'One Nation, One Election' was not the sole purpose of her trip to the national capital.

Political observers here feel that the insistence of the Chief Minister to be present in the state Assembly during the budget session has gained significance, as there are talks that BJP’s legislative team is fully charged to attack the state government during the session on the recent CAG findings about non-submission of utilisation certificates by the state government on fund utilisation under various centrally-sponsored schemes.

The issue has gained further significance after leader of opposition in the Assembly, Suvendu Adhikari, met Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and discussed about the CAG findings.