Jagdeep Dhankhar tweeted on the no-show by Bengal officials. (File)
West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar and Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee exchanged increasingly bitter letters on Monday in the latest chapter in their long-running feud. It started when the Governor called upon Mamata Banerjee to "personally update" him on the protests in the state against the citizenship law after two top officials did not show up to brief him.
Mamata Banerjee, in response, made it clear that briefing the Governor was not the "prime focus" of her administration and wrote that he must "please cooperate" to maintain peace. The Governor swiftly replied expressing "deep pain and anguish" at what he called her "unwarranted tangential approach".
The Governor spent the better part of the day tweeting about his failed attempt to get a proper briefing on the protests in Bengal. "In view of the enormity of the situation I have called upon Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee to personally update me at Raj Bhawan tomorrow at a time of her choice. There is no response from Chief Secretary and DGP (Director General of Police) thus far. This is unfortunate and unexpected of them," the Governor tweeted after the no-show by the top officials.
"Am stunned that in spite of request made neither Chief Secretary nor Director General of Police have come to brief and update me on the current painful situation in the State. This is surely not acceptable given the enormity of situation," Mr Dhankhar tweeted. The Governor advised the Chief Minister to "engage in soul searching".
In a terse reply, the Chief Minister said she was "really sorry" to see the Governor's frequent tweets and press briefings criticising the state government and senior officers.
"You would no doubt appreciate that the prime focus of the state administration at present is to maintain peaceful situation as against what is going on throughout the country. The constitutional obligation in my view is to support the state government machinery to maintain peace and harmony rather than aggravating the situation by provoking the elements who may attempt to disturb the order and tranquility," said Ms Banerjee.
The Governor replied that he had been "heaped indignities" during his term in Bengal but would like to collaborate in the larger public interest.
In the morning, Governor Dhankhar had tweeted that he was extremely anguished at Mamata Banerjee's "unconstitutional and inflammatory" actions, after she announced a protest march in Kolkata against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act.
The Chief Minister led the march from Red Road to Jorasanko Thakur Bari, the ancestral house of Rabindranath Tagore in north Kolkata. Addressing a meeting after the march ended at Jorasanko, Ms Banerjee announced that the centre could bring the citizenship law in her state only "over her dead body".
"As long as I am alive, I will never implement the citizenship law or NRC in the state. You can very well dismiss my government or put me behind bars but I will never implement this black law. We will continue to protest democratically till this law is scrapped. If they want to implement it in Bengal they will have to do it over my dead body," she said.
Ms Banerjee also asserted "no one will be ousted from the state".
Over the next three days, the Chief Minister will participate in various protests to demand the scrapping of the citizenship law, which facilitates Indian citizenship for non-Muslims from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh.