Bengal needs modern industries with jobs that come with them:PM

Burnpur, West Bengal, Dec. 24 (UNI) As a controversy rages over the acquisition of Singur farm land for the Tatas' small car factory, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today said West Bengal needed modern industries for the jobs ''that come with them''.

''Bengal needs modern industries with jobs that come with them...a time has come for a new era of economic development in the state and it must move forward,'' he said while laying the foundation for expansion and modernisation of Indian Iron and Steel Company(IISCO) here.

He, however, did not mention the Singur issue, taken up by the opposition, especially Ms Mamata Banerjee, as a plank for movement against the Left Front Government.

Emphasising the need for rapid modernisation and industrialisation, the Prime Minister said West Bengal must join the march of progress and benefit from the rapid economic growth in the country.

''The state needs a process of industrialisation that is employment-intensive and welfare-enhancing as well as humane and just. Every section of society should benefit from industrialisation,'' he added.

Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, facing a stiff opposition from the Trinamool Congress and the Congress on the Singur issue, was on the dais when the Prime Minister was speaking.

A delegation of Pradesh Congress had met the Prime Minister at the Raj Bhavan shortly after his arrival in Kolkata last night to hand over a memorandum recording objection to the selection of the agricultural land of Singur for the small car project.

However, Dr Singh told the delegation that he had full knowledge of whatever was going to take place in Singur.

Ms Mamata Banerjee has been on a hunger strike for 21 days demanding that the Tatas' project be shifted from Singur. However, in a revised stand, she later demanded that the government give back the sizable chunk of the acquired land which had been 'forcibly' taken away from the local farmers.

Calling upon West Bengal to lead the country in enterprise and industry, the Prime Minister said once the state showed the way in industrial development, but later it lagged behind for the last quarter of a century.

''It was here at Kulti that the first modern iron-making unit in India was started more than a century ago. It was here in Bengal that the industrialisation of India began,'' he said.

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