Tripura CPI-M criticizes Centre for making 'false statements' on projects

AGARTALA: The Opposition CPI-M on Wednesday slammed the Centre and Prime Minister Narendra Modi allegedly for giving ''wrong credit'' to the BJP government for setting up of the projects in Tripura, which were either undertaken or completed during the Left Front's regime, and were inaugurated and laid the foundation stones by Modi on Tuesday.

The Prime Minister on Tuesday inaugurated and laid foundation stones of nine mega projects worth Rs 3,518 crore including the 1.9-km-long 'Maitre Setu' (Friendship Bridge), built at a cost of Rs 133 crore over river Feni connecting southern Tripura with Bangladesh's Ramgarh to get access to the Chittagong international sea port.

The State secretary of CPI-M (Communist Party of India-Marxist), Gautam Das has lashed out at the ''totally false speech of the Prime Minister'' delivered virtually to mark the third anniversary of the BJP-led government.

Das said that Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina while virtually addressing Tuesday's Feni Bridge inaugural function clearly stated that the proposal for the 'Maitre Setu' had been made by then Chief Mminister Manik Sarkar in 2010 through the Union External Affairs Ministry, and she had accepted the proposal then.

''The previous Left Front government had also made financial allocation for the vital bridge. But the Prime Minister took the credit for this and prasied the BJP government in Tripura.

''Similarly, the PM gave wrong statement on the Agartala-Akhaura railway project, which was proposed by the then Left government and agreed by the erstwhile Congress led UPA government and Hasinia approved it when she visited New Delhi in 2010,'' said Das, also a CPI-M central committee member.

He added that in 1952, CPI-M MPs Biren Dutta and Dasharatha Deb had raised the State's connectivity issue in Parliament; and after many decades, the Left Front government had succeeded in approving the Agartala-Akhaura (Bangladesh) railway project.

Das also said that most of the other projects either inaugurated or laid foundation stones by the Prime Minister had been initiated by the previous CPI-M-led government.

''The credit for all the works of these projects are being sought to be taken by the BJP government falsely; and, the Prime Minister, wrongly briefed by his partymen, endorsed the falsehood but the people of the State know everything and will draw their own conclusion,'' said the Left leader.

He alleged that during three years of BJP governance in Tripura instead of development, people only witnessed ''destruction''. (IANS)

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