CPI-M slept for the past 34 years: Mamata

CM said people will not beg anymore as Bengal is progressing

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee Saturday said nobody would need to "beg and eat" in the state as her government was carrying forward a slew of development projects across all sectors.

She lashed out at the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) for having "slept through the last 34 years".

The CPI-M had ruled the state uninterruptedly for 34 years before Banerjee's Trinamool Congress came to power in 2011.

Banerjee took a jibe at the CPI-M, Congress and the BJP for being "envious" of her government's progress.

"We will go forward with developmental work and progress... The youth should not fear... No one will have to beg and eat," she said at a public rally at Raidighi in South-24 Parganas district.

The chief minister inaugurated 44 projects, including the Rs.3.5 crore worth Raidighi stadium.

She announced plans to develop Jharkhali, an island in the Sunderban mangroves, as a tourism hub.

"We are soon going to start chopper services to Sunderbans. Jharkhali will be developed as a tourism hub," she said, adding that the first women's university was coming up in Diamond Harbour.

"Women should not get married at an early age... They should study," she said.

Banerjee said her government has taken up a lot of projects in the last two-and-a-half years since it came to power whereas the CPI-M had failed to do so.

"They were sleeping for the last 34 years and now suddenly they are awake and have started slogan-shouting and conducting meetings.

"The CPI-M, Congress and the BJP are all envious as we progress. They are bristling with envy and there is no cure for envy," she said.