A war of words broke out on Friday out between Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee over the issue of a recent Army exercise in West Bengal. In a letter to her, Parrikar said the Chief Minister’s allegations against the Army can “adversely” impact the morale of the forces and this was not “expected from a person of her standing and experience in public life”. Taking strong exception, Mamata replied the Centre was using the Army to achieve their political purpose.
Parrikar in the letter written to Banerjee on Thursday expressed “deep pain” over her allegations against the Army for its recent exercise at toll gates in the State and said while the political parties and politicians may have the luxury of making “wild and unsubstantiated allegations against each other,” one needs to be extremely careful while referring to the Armed forces. “Your allegations in this regard run the risk of adversely impacting the morale of the country’s Armed forces and the same were not expected from a person of your standing and experience in public life,” the Minister said.
Banerjee had accused the Centre of deploying the Army at toll plazas in West Bengal without informing the State Government and described it as “unprecedented” and “a very serious situation worse than Emergency”. The TMC chief had refused to leave her office in Kolkata till the Army men were withdrawn from toll plazas, and had asked whether it was an “Army coup,” drawing sharp reaction from the Centre.
Reacting to CM’s allegations last week, Parrikar termed it as an “avoidable controversy” and the exercise carried out by the Eastern Command in West Bengal and other States under it jurisdiction was to collect information about movement of heavy vehicles at toll gates.
He also said such exercises are undertaken by all formations of the Army all across the country for many years adding the exercises are held as per the dates convenient to the Army in consultation with agencies of the State Government.
Maintaining that the Army was in regular touch with the State administration regarding the exercise, he said “I have been deeply pained by your allegations as reported in the media. If only you had enquired with the agencies concerned of the state government, you would have come to know of the extensive correspondence between the Army and the state agencies including the joint inspection of sites carried out by them."
He also said the army authorities were forced to put the record straight in the matter by presenting evidence of their communication with the state agencies including rescheduling of the data collection operations on their response.