File photo of West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee
Residents of a remote village in the former Maoist stronghold of Junglemahal were today taken by surprise when Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee drove in with a convoy unannounced.
Seeing little children standing around wide-eyed at Gopinathpur village in Binpur block of West Midnapore district, the Chief Minister asked them if they were given midday meals in their schools.
"Do you get midday meals? Is the food cooked all right?" she asked, trying to put the children at ease.
When the children told her timidly that they were given rice and fish in midday meals, Ms Banerjee asked, "Don't you get eggs?"
When the children did not reply, the Chief Minister asked officials accompanying her to look into it.
Flustered by her visit, women in the village handed Ms Banerjee a glass of milk. Ms Banerjee declined the milk, saying, "You can give me whatever you have. I like muri (puffed rice). Give me muri and tea."
She asked villagers whether they were getting the benefits of housing scheme Indira Awaaz Yoyana.
When the villagers told her that they were not, the Chief Minister asked District Magistrate (DM) Mohamammed Ghulam Ali Ansari to arrange construction of houses for the BPL population in the village under the scheme.
The villagers said that all 22 houses in the village were built of mud.
She asked the villagers to join the 100-day work guarantee scheme and asked the DM to look into it.