Mamata warns she will not allow Darjeeling to go Andhra way

Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee today warned that Darjeeling cannot be allowed to go the Andhra Pradesh way, asserting till she was alive she would not give an inch of land away.
Attacking the BJP and the Congress for the "game" they played on the Andhra Pradesh bifurcation issue, Banerjee said this time they would not succeed.
"Till I am alive, I will not give an inch of land this way. In the interest of politics, the land cannnot be ceded this way. If you think that you will play the same game as you did in Andhra Pradesh, you will not succeed," she told an election meeting here.

Banerjee's outburst followed BJP vice-president and nominee for the Darjeeling LS seat S S Ahluwalia's support for the formation of a separate state of Gorkhaland.
Ahluwalia today told reporters in Darjeeling, "The BJP has always supported creation of smaller states as Jharkhand and Chattisgarh and was in favour of Telangana and so Gorkhaland should also be formed."
Banerjee accused the Congress and the BJP of making an understanding over the Telengana bill and said that any attempt to divide Bengal would not be allowed.

It depended on the state government whether a state would be bifurcated or not and that is only after consulting the state government on the issue, she pointed out.

Accusing the BJP of pursuing "communal and divisive" politics and the Congress "anti-people policies", she said that there was a need for a change in the government.
"There is a politics to make money and corruption and there is a politics to divide the people on communal lines," she told the rally.
"There are no differences between the Congress and the BJP. The BJP only attacks the UPA government when elections are round the corner," she said wondering what the saffron party was doing when her party was up in arms against the Congress-led UPA government over the issue of price rise and other issues.

She defended her parting of ways with the NDA on communal issues and walking out of an alliance with UPA in 2012 over the FDI in retail.