Supporting GST was our greatest mistake: Mamata Banerjee

Kolkata: The Trinamool Congress's greatest mistake was to extend support to the Union government for rolling out goods & services tax (GSR), its national President and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said on Tuesday.

"After GST being rolled out, the Union government is taking away all the money from the state without releasing the state's share on this count. Our greatest mistake was to extend support to the Union government in rolling out GST. We thought that the state would benefit from it. But now the Union government has stopped releasing all funds under the different centrally-sponsored schemes. Starting from MGNREGE to PMAY, the funds under schemes have stopped reaching the state," she said while inaugurating a rural-road network at Singur in Hooghly district, which is erstwhile sire for Nano, Tata Motors' small car project.

Banerjee said that from Wednesday, she will be going for a sit- in demonstration at the base of B.R. Ambedkar statue at Red Road in Kolkata which will continue till 7 p.m. on Thursday.

"I had been in a fasting agitation for 14 days demanding return of land for unwilling farmers in Singur. Later after coming to power, we returned that land to the farmers of Singur. The farmers of Singur gave total support to our movement on this issue," she claimed.

Banerjee also said that under the state's own rural road development schemes, a fresh 9,000 km of rural road network will be set up besides renovation of 12,000 km of existing rural roads. She also claimed that her government has set a target to complete the project before the forthcoming monsoon.

"Singur had always been close to my heart and hence I decided to start this programme from here," she said.