The Trinamool Congress on Sunday came down heavily on the Centre for hiking railway fares and announced its plans to stage week-long protests demanding its immediate withdrawal.
Attacking the new NDA Government for ‘failing to keep its promises’, Trinamool Congress number two Mukul Roy said, “Before coming to power, the BJP said that they would work for the poor so that good days can return. But after coming to power, they have started taking anti-people decisions like the unprecedented steep hike in railway fares.” He added that the Government hiked the fares ahead of the Monsoon Session ‘because it wanted to evade protests in the lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha.’
Claiming that “never since Independence, India had witnessed such a steep hike”, Roy said, “The decision itself shows how much attached this Government is with big business interests. They can never be the friends of the poor.”
Blaming the Centre for contributing to the rising prices as “rise in railway freight will jack up the price of essential commodities”, Roy said, “The Modi Government is showing its true colours now.” Declaring that the Trinamool would hit the streets from Monday in a week-long agitational progamme, the former Railway Minister said: “Tomorrow, we will take out a protest rally in which our MPs and MlAs will participate. Such rallies would continue for a full week and our youth, women and other wings will take part in these rallies.”
The party would also hold protests in both lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha, he said.
The Trinamool's decision to hit the streets comes close on the heels of widespread criticism from the Opposition circle which held the biggest party of the State for “its compliance in the railway fare hike” in the wake of an alleged “give-and-take agreement between the Bengal Government and the Centre through which the Centre conceded to Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s demand of shifting the proposed AIIMS from Raiganj in North Bengal to Kalyani nearer Kolkata.”