Mamata to seek Centre's nod to visit Manipur

Kolkata, May 30 (IANS) West Bengal chief minister will write to the Centre for permission to visit violence-hit Manipur, Mamata Banejee said this to a section of the media.

After accusing the Centre of neglecting the issue, she expressed her eagerness to visit the state and stand by the affected people and the families of the victims.

Earlier, she even accused the BJP and Centre of making attempts to provoke Manipur-like caste violence in West Bengal by instigating the people from the Kurmi community against the people from other tribal backgrounds.

A couple of days ago after the attack on the convoy of Trinamool Congress's national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee allegedly by some members of the Kurmi, the chief minister made this accusation against the Union government and BJP. Prior to that she had said that because of the negligence of the Union government and the reluctance of the Union ministers to visit Manipur, the situation has worsened there.

Since the beginning of the clashes in Manipur on May 3, over 100 people have been killed. Despite huge deployment of security forces and Indian Army personnel the situation there is yet to be under control. In such a situation, the chief minister's decision to seek permission from the Union government to go there has created rumblings in the political circles of the state.

The BJP leadership has described the chief minister's proposal to visit Manipur as her attempt to divert attention from deteriorating law & order situation in West Bengal.

According to senior state BJP leader Rahul Sinha, the chief minister should first attempt to control violence in her own state rather than take initiative to solve the Manipur problem. "Rather I feel that her presence there would worsen the situation further," Sinha said.