May 18, 2011
Cops must be neutral, Mamata Banerjee tells CP
Kolkata, May 18: Police commissioner R K Pachnanda on Tuesday met Chief Minister-in-waiting Mamata Banerjee at her Kalighat residence. The meeting, which lasted for more than 30 minutes, covered various law and order issues of the city. Mamata Banerjee apparently asked him to be firm in dealing with hooliganism and lawlessness. She was categorical about police being impartial. “Police don’t need to bother about political colour of the law-breakers,” she said.
It has been a long-cherished dream of Mamata Banerjee to offer the state an impartial administration and good governance. Her biggest complaint against the Left Front government was that it had made the administration subservient to the party and thus the administration remained partisan in its action. On Tuesday, during her first encounter with the head of the city’s police department, her message was sound and clear.
Mamata Banerjee was peeved at the shocking clash that happened right inside the city police headquarters within a day after she had given police a free hand in controlling political violence. On Tuesday, she once more reminded that such indiscipline would not be tolerated.
Commissioner of police R K Pachnanda entered Mamata Banerjee’s office adjacent to her home at 4.10 pm. He first briefed her about the security arrangements for the swearing-in ceremony and the renewed security arrangement for the Chief Minister-in waiting. Significantly, Mamata Banerjee, whose security is of Z+ category, still has railway protection force personnel guarding her. After her resignation from the railway ministry, the city police will take care of her security.
The stream of people did not stop coming at her door-step even on Tuesday. A huge number of people queued up in the barricaded portion in front of her house just to catch a glimpse of her. Ms Banerjee issued a strict instruction to her party colleagues and security personnel that people coming to her house must not feel any problem. Every half an hour, she came out to oblige people. She waved, people waved back. She thanked everyone standing in the queue, people roar her name.
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