Mamata leaves kin to change address

Kolkata, Oct 23 (UNI) Denying that family dispute behind her sudden change in address, Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee today said she had left her residence to get ''more close to the people''.

''I do not have any grouse against anybody. The reason that I want to stay closer to the people made me shift here. There is nothing else in it,'' she told reporters, while addressing a press conference at the Trinamool Congress Bhavan.

The Trinamool leader, leaving behind her brothers and other relatives, had walked out of her Kalighat residence yesterday evening with mother Gayatri Devi and taken shelter in the party office in Tiljala area on the eastern fringe of the city.

A spinster Ms Banerjee had been living in a joint family with her brothers.

She had left a note with the local police informing them of her change in address, stoking speculations over a possible family spat.

Police, however, said they treated the letter as a general diary and not as a complaint.

In reply to a question, Ms Banerjee said she would be staying in the party office at least for the time being. ''I have taken along my mother since she cannot live without me,'' she said.

UNI