Kolkata: Bengal BJP on Sunday picked up some cues from the Union Budget and expanded these to stress creation of critical infrastructure in Bengal. Durgapur and Dankuni, netas said, will now have immense growth potential.State BJP netas said that the proposal of an integrated east coast industrial corridor, with a node at Durgapur, is going to open up growth opportunities. “The industrial corridor projects are aimed at developing futuristic cities. Connecting Dankuni via the freight corridor will facilitate cargo movement across west and east,” said a neta.“Durgapur was once a vibrant industrial centre. But what did we do to Durgapur ?” asked Ashok Lahiri, Balurghat MLA and former chief economic adviser to the Union govt. “Each year we get to hear that there was nothing for Bengal in the Budget. What people fail to understand is that the Budget cannot be a state-specific exercise,” Lahiri said. “The state has vote-on-accounts soon, and I am waiting for the chief minister’s announcements,” he added.While CM Mamata Banerjee said that she had proposed a freight corridor that would touch Dankuni while she was the Railway minister, Bengal BJP chief Samik Bhattacharya said, “She announced a number of projects and laid foundation stones. Nothing happened after that.”BJP Bengal vice-president Jagannath Chattopadhyay said that the Dankuni-Amritsar freight corridor could not be expanded since state govt failed to acquire land for the project.Netas also said that Bengal could benefit from proposals like the allocation of Rs 5,000 crore for temple cities, a centre for the National Institute of Design and the All India Institute of Ayurveda in eastern India, and 500 ‘amrit sagars’for fishermen.
