CM meets PM, gets freight corridor issue resolved

West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee cashed in on his personal equation with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to get the Centre...

West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee cashed in on his personal equation with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to get the Centre8217;s seal of approval on the railway freight corridor that would now stretch from Ludhiana to Kolkata, instead of terminating at Son Nagar in Chhapra, Bihar as proposed in the Railway Budget.

The PM8217;s nod came after the two leaders met today morning ahead of the CPIM Politburo meeting, which discussed Iran first among other things. The PM asked Bhattacharjee to talk to Railway Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav and Yadav was said to have assured the CM that the proposal by the Left had for all purposes been accepted.

The Politburo met to draft a hard-hitting statement on India8217;s stand on Iran, saying that 8216;8216;the consequences of this stand will be serious8217;8217;.

Evidently, Bhattacharjee had effectively made the demarcation between the roles of CM and party politburo member. On the freight corridor issue, Left leaders had protested when Yadav was presenting the Budget in the Lok Sabha and even threatened to vote against the Budget if the eastern-end of the freight corridor was not extended till Kolkata. Yadav had later called up Basudeb Achariya, CPIM leader in the Lok Sabha, to assure him that the demand would be looked into. With today8217;s meeting, the Bengal CM was able to remove doubts, if any, on the issue.

During the meeting with the PM, Bhattacharjee also brought up the issue of investment regions in the country being identified by an NRI group, comprising Victor Menezes, Indra Nooyi and Purnendu Chatterjee, and working under the aegis of the government.

The NRI group is picking states that can develop as investment hubs in the country. States identified as investment centres will not only attract capital but also get new employment opportunities, which West Bengal wants.