Shah says Bengal not letting in migrants

State govt hits back with list of 8 trains, seeks apology from home minister

Union home minister Amit Shah on Saturday accused West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s government of not allowing “shramik (worker)” trains run by the Railways to reach the state, calling it an “injustice” for Bengali migrants stranded across the country. The Trinamul Congress reacted swiftly and sharply, listing the scheduled of eight trains and the state government’s preparations as evidence, and asked Mr Shah to either “prove” his allegations or “apologise.”

In a letter to Banerjee, the Union home minister highlighted the Central government’s help to more than two lakh migrants to reach home in ‘Shramik Special’ trains.

“Migrants from West Bengal are also eager to reach home. The Central government is facilitating but we are not getting expected support from W.B. state government, which is not allowing the trains to reach WB. This is injustice with WB migrant labourers. This will create further hardship for them,” he alleged.

Lambasting Shah, Diamond Harbour Trinamul Congress MP and CM’s nephew Abhishek Banerjee tweeted, “A HM failing to discharge his duties during this crisis speaks after weeks of silence, only to mislead people with bundle of lies! Ironically he’s talking about the very ppl who’ve been literally left to fate by his own Govt. Mr @AmitShah, prove your fake allegations or apologise.”(sic)

Echoing him, Trinamul Rajya Sabha MP Derek O’Brien claimed on Twitter, “The Home Minister finally surfaces after 45 days. What’s the first thing he does in the middle of a national health emergency? Leaks his letter (riddled with lies) attacking his favourite foe: Bengal.”

He shared the list of eight trains, prepared by the state government till May 8, to bring back the migrant labourers from four states.

Among the listed, four trains - three from Bengaluru in Karnataka and one from Hyderabad in Telangana were expected to depart on Saturday itself. While two more are planned from Punjab on May 10 and 11, two others are expected to start from Vellore in Tamil Nadu on May 11.

But state BJP president Dilip Ghosh argued that the state government woke up only after Shah’s letter.

So far the state has recorded 99 Covid-19 deaths including 11 fatalities

in the last 24 hours with the total number of infected rising to 1,786.