Buddha goes silent,may skip party meet

Buddhadeb Bhattarcharjee has gone silent. While he has been attending party meetings,a state secretariat member said he had hardly spoken since the results came out.

Buddhadeb Bhattarcharjee has gone silent. While he has been attending party meetings,a state secretariat member said he had hardly spoken since the results came out. The outgoing CM is also likely to skip the party central committee meeting to be held in Delhi in the last week of June.

The swords are already out,with Abdur Rezaq Mollah,Minister for Land and Land Reforms,directly attacking Buddhadeb at the state secretariat meeting on Friday,where party state secretary Biman Bose offered to quit.

Talking about Buddhadeb and outgoing minister for commerce and industries Nirupam Sen,Mollah said: The first one cannot even catch a poisonless snake,but tried to catch a cobra. And so far as Nirupam is concerned,the whole world knew that he would lose and he did not know it. In fact,he is the author of all our misfortunes.

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While others protested,Buddhadeb didnt say much. The CPM leader,who continues to enjoy Z-plus security,has already discarded his bullet-proof official vehicle as well as the security provided by the state government.

He said he would leave it to the new government to decide the kind of security to be provided to him, Jaideep Mukherjee,Buddhadebs Confidential Assistant,said.

IN COMES MAMATA

* Mamata Banerjee is getting the chief ministers office remodelled. One of the things to go is the branch of a bank that used to handle transactions pertaining to the Chief Ministers Relief Fund. She may also have bring in officers of own choice,with two ministers of state in charge as she had promised earlier.

* She will take oath on the lawns of Raj Bhavan,tentatively on May 18. Earlier Mamata wanted the ceremony to take place at Brigade Parade Ground but Governor M K Narayanan objected,citing security reasons.