Mamata to announce her plans after Oct. 6

By Malabika Bhattacharya

CALCUTTA, OCT. 4. The process of the Trinamool Congress chief Ms. Mamata Banerjee's return to the Union Cabinet suffered a big blow today following the Centre's announcement that it would address the issue of rollback of petro prices only in the last week of October.

According to highly placed sources, Ms. Banerjee has advised her party colleagues to be prepared for a pull-out in the likely event of the Government not rolling back the prices at all.

The truce that was hammered out at the instance of Prime Minister, Mr. A.B. Vajpayee, between Ms. Banerjee and the Centre by Mr. Sudhindra Kulkarni, the official in-charge of Bengal affairs in the PMO, showed signs of a rupture when the Cabinet Committee for Economic Affairs (CCEA) ruled out today any downward revision of prices of petroleum products.

During the day, Mr. Vajpayee is believed to have told Ms. Banerjee by telephone that she take back her resignation, return to Delhi and wait for him to review the issue of price rise only after completion of his knee surgery in the third week of October.

The tenor of Mr. Vajpayee's argument is believed to have upset Ms. Banerjee who is reported to have told her colleagues that the Prime Minister could have effected at least a 5 per cent rollback immediately and put the same on hold till he returned from the Mumbai hospital if he so desired. In public, she however, remained unfazed and said that she would respond to the new sequence of events only after October 6 when Mr. Vajpayee had promised to have her demand examined.

"Please don't press me for a comment tonight. I will unveil my position only after the date originally given to me."

It is learnt, Ms. Banerjee's lieutenants mounted a major exercise in prevailing upon her not to take any drastic step in view of the coming Assembly poll.

From the Trinamool's standpoint, Mr. Kulkarni's briefing on return to Delhi to the Prime Minister provoked the unscheduled CCEA meeting and the hardening of the Government's position on Trinamool.

In order to demonstrate that she is not alone in her demand, Ms. Banerjee managed to convince the Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister, Mr. Chandrababu Naidu-led TDP to call for a rollback of the increase petro prices. Mr. Naidu had no difficulty obliging her as he realised that a rollback at any point would be politically beneficial to the TDP which is currently facing a major campaign from the Opposition, notably the Left and the Congress(I).

Meanwhile, the West Bengal Chief Minister, Mr. Jyoti Basu, joined forces with TDP and said: "We too demand full rollback of prices. The BJP Government is selling the country to foreigners. Mr. Naidu's demand is apt, timely and what Ms. Banerjee is doing is simply play-acting."

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