Bengal govt playing politics with people: BJP leader

New Delhi, Feb 09: Attacking the West Bengal regime, BJP member Locket Chatterjee on Monday said the TMC government was playing politics with people, including on coronavirus vaccines, and asserted that the people will give their reply this year.

West Bengal is set to go for assembly elections in the coming months. Against this backdrop, Chatterjee alleged that the state government was not doing anything for the people and that the state''s chief minister was in "silent mode".

Speaking during a discussion on the Motion of Thanks on the President''s address to Parliament at the start of the Budget session, Chatterjee said there are various problems and incidents in West Bengal but "Didi is in silent mode", an apparent reference to Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.

The state government is doing politics with vaccines, just renaming various central government schemes and mismanaging funds, Chatterjee alleged.

"People will give reply in 2021," she said during her speech, which was a mix of Bengali, Hindi and English.

Amid recent controversy over chanting of Jai Shri Ram in West Bengal, Chatterjee said, "Jai Shri Ram is not a bad word... It is not just uttered by BJP but by the whole nation".

The remarks were greeted with thumping of desks by BJP MPs.

Asserting that "we will not allow West Bengal to be an East Pakistan," the BJP member said the place where Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee was born, "it is ours".

"If you want to do rajneeti (politics), do with us and not with people," she stressed.

Speaker Om Birla asked Chatterjee not to take names of people who are not part of the House when she mentioned a TMC minister.

Congress member Hibi Eden sought to raise a point of order saying that Chatterjee was misleading the House by mentioning that late former president Pranab Mukherjee was an advisor to the BJP government, which Eden said was not right.

In response, Birla said he had listened to the speech and did not hear anything critical about Pranab Mukherjee but added that he will still look at the records.

While Chatterjee initiated the discussion last week, it could not be taken forward as the House proceedings were repeatedly adjourned amid protests by Opposition parties against the new farm laws.