Calcutta, 16 January 2013

It is very clear that the Vibrant Gujarat Summit has turned out as the benchmark in the arena of investment summits in India. Therefore when West Bengal Chief Minister organized the second edition of ‘Bengal leads’ summit on Tuesday, every media house in Kolkata and beyond began an article on Bengal summit, with its comparison to the just concluded Vibrant Gujarat summit. Mamata was obviously not happy with it, and her speech reflected it.

“There is some media which are based here here but sing paeans to Gujarat. I am happy at that, but one must not forget that Gujarat has huge geographical and business potential. They have a huge advantage over us,” Banerjee said here addressing an investors’ summit.

“Gujarat has 17 ports while we have only two. Moreover, their population density is lower than ours, while their area is more than us. They do not have huge financial debts like we have,” she said, addressing the ‘Bengal Leads’ summit.

Banerjee’s comments were a reference to constant comparison in a section of media between ‘Bengal Leads’ and ‘Vibrant Gujarat’ – a similar investors’ meet hosted by the Modi government where the who’s who of the industry was present. In contrast, the Bengal version was mostly devoid of big names.

“Gujarat has a revenue of over Rs.35,000 crore annually and they do not have to pay any interest on debts while we earn only Rs.26,000 crore and all of it goes towards servicing the debts which was incurred by the (erstwhile) Left Front government,” she added.

She said that Bengal had to cope with regular shutdowns and strikes while the Bharatiya Janata Party-governed state had no such trouble.

During her address, she also mentioned her effort as the then railways minister to set up a railway track within ’12 hours’ to facilitate movement of rescue and relief work to the quake hit Bhuj district of Gujarat in 2001.

“The relief material was stranded due to destruction of rail and road network and everybody was concerned. But I said ‘Give me just 12 hours’. And you won’t believe I completed the setting of the railway track within 12 hours to allow the relief material to reach the affected people in Bhuj area,” said Banerjee.

Banerjee’s comments were a reference to constant comparison in a section of media between ‘Bengal Leads’ and ‘Vibrant Gujarat’ – a similar investors’ meet hosted by the Modi government where the who’s who of the industry was present. In contrast, the Bengal version was mostly devoid of big names.