BJP criticises Mamata’s decision not to impose night Curfew in Bengal

Kolkata,19 May(HS): West Bengal state unit of BJP has strongly condemned the state government’s decision not to impose the 12 hours night curfew in the state from 7 PM during lockdown 4.0, and said it was in clear violation of the directive of the Union Home Ministry and was purely unconstitutional.

Strongly reacting to the state government’s decision in this regard as announced by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee at state Secretariat Nabanna last night, BJP state President Dilip Ghosh MP wondered that on one hand, she had decided to resume most of the economic activities in the state after they were allowed by the Centre, on the other, she had decided not to impose the Curfew to strictly implement the lockdown rules and instead left the issue on the judgement of the people.

Expressing concern at the sudden rush in the opening of all small and medium businesses and most of the other trading activities in the state besides the running of all public transport systems including those of auto rickshaws from 21 May, the BJP President apprehended that it might once again create the possibility of another surge of COVID-19 to affect many more people.

Moreover, the Chief Minister’s decision not to impose the night Curfew despite the Centre’s directive might also help in increasing the chance of many more COVID-19 cases in the city itself as many people might not follow her good advice.

Alleging that the Chief Minister was ‘totally confused’ on how to contain the spread of COVID-19 in the state, Ghosh also ridiculed her decision to unnecessarily divide the city’s Containment zones into three groups of A, B and C.

She would have achieved the same objective, had she decided to follow the Central guidelines in toto, Ghosh said while criticising her decision also of reopening the hawker’s markers, salons and even beauty parlours at the present juncture in the middle of lockdown 4.0.

It would have been far better if she waited a few more days till further normalisation of the situation before deciding to reopen such business activities which did not fall under the category of emergency activities, Ghosh pointed out.

Asked to comment on the Chief Minister’s repeated criticism about the  Prime Minister’s announcement of  Rs 20 lakh crores worth of stimulus package by describing it as a ‘big zero’, the BJP chief claimed that such uttering was nothing but a true reflection of her frustration after the union government did not transfer any money directly into the state coffers despite her repeated appeal while providing all assistance through various projects ensuring large scale employment generation.

Turning his attention to the condition of thousands of hapless migrant workers from Bengal many of whom walked hundreds of kilometres on the highways and over railway tracks in a desperate bid to reach home, Dilip Ghosh squarely blamed the state government for its alleged lackadaisical attitudes in arranging  trains for them like several other states.

Instead of suddenly becoming very proactive, she should have requested the Railway Ministry for more trains long ago to end the miseries of these people, he said.

About the excessive demand of private bus owners in the state in terms of new fares structures to resume their services, Ghosh blamed the situation as state-sponsored and said despite all bus owners’ unions belonged to the ruling party they failed to control them and wanted to pass the bucks on to the common people.