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The Supreme Court on Friday sought responses from the Election Commission, the West Bengal government and the state poll panel on a PIL seeking disclosure of assembly constituency-wise data of claims and objections filed by deleted voters during the SIR process. A bench comprising Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V Mohana was hearing the plea filed by Prasenjit Bose, chairperson of the SIR Committee of West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee. The petition, filed through lawyer Neha Rathi, sought assembly constituency-wise data relating to the West Bengal Special Intensive Revision (SIR) process, including the number of Forms 6 and 7 filed, admitted and rejected, as well as details regarding the pendency and disposal of appeals before the appellate tribunals. Senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayan, appearing for Bose, said that the manner in which 18 tribunals set up to deal with the claims and objections of deleted voters are functioning is causing discrepancie
Flipkart on Monday said it would deepen its long-term investments in West Bengal, expanding its supply chain infrastructure, seller ecosystem and skills initiatives in the state, which houses the company's largest fulfilment centre in India. The Walmart-owned e-commerce company said West Bengal is home to its largest fulfilment and logistics hub, located at Haringhata, and remains central to its long-term growth strategy. The Haringhata campus has a storage capacity of 5 million cubic feet across six mezzanine levels and features automated storage and retrieval systems, robotic packaging arms, cross-belt sorters and a nine-kilometre conveyor network. Flipkart said the facility is the first e-commerce fulfilment centre of its scale in India to receive the Indian Green Building Council's Platinum certification. Across West Bengal, the company operates more than 300 fulfilment centres, mother hubs and last-mile delivery facilities, supporting more than 120,000 direct and indirect jobs
West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari on Saturday announced that his government would introduce a single-window clearance mechanism for investment proposals of Rs 100 crore and above, asserting that land availability would not be a constraint for industries in the state. Speaking at the foundation stone-laying ceremony of a new manufacturing facility of Lux Industries at Dankuni in Hooghly district, Adhikari said the government was committed to creating a business-friendly environment and attracting fresh investments. "There will be a single-window clearance system for investment proposals worth Rs 100 crore and above. Land availability will not be an issue for industry," he said, laying the foundation stone for the Rs 600-crore plant. Claiming that West Bengal was poised to regain its position as a leading investment destination, he said the state was entering a new phase of industrial growth. "West Bengal will once again become India's top destination for investment. A ...
The West Bengal government has constituted a high-level committee headed by former Supreme Court judge Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai to examine a draft Uniform Civil Code for the state. A government notification issued on Friday said the committee was formed in view of the "wide ramifications and voluminous nature" of the proposed legislation. The panel will undertake a comprehensive examination of the draft Bill before any further steps are taken, it said. The state government said it has prepared the draft Bill with the objective of creating a comprehensive legal framework governing personal civil matters for residents of the state, irrespective of religion, faith or community. The proposed legislation seeks to deal with issues relating to marriage, divorce, intestate succession and testamentary succession, it said. Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai (retd.) will chair the committee, the notification stated. Other members include former Meghalaya governor Tathagata Roy, Resident ...
Launching a blistering counterattack against the rebel faction that has torn the Trinamool Congress apart, party supremo Mamata Banerjee on Saturday accused the dissidents of conspiring with the BJP to engineer a split and dared them to formally join the saffron party if they had the courage. In an emotionally charged Facebook Live address, her first since the party plunged into its worst organisational crisis, Banerjee defended her leadership, lashed out at the rebels, vowed to press ahead with the TMC's July 21 Martyrs' Day rally despite administrative hurdles, and declared that while individuals may desert the party, "an institution does not cease to exist". Responding to the allegations, the BJP claimed that leaders were quitting TMC because the cut money, which "acted as its binding glue", has been stopped after the saffron party came to power. "I dare the treacherous and ungrateful traitors who are abandoning the party to directly join the BJP and take me on if they have the .
In yet another setback for the Mamata Banerjee faction of the Trinamool Congress, the party's Bengal state president Chandrima Bhattacharya stepped down from her position on Saturday, barely a month after she was entrusted with the crucial organisational responsibility in the aftermath of the party's assembly election debacle. In a letter addressed to the Trinamool Congress chairperson, Bhattacharya also resigned from all other posts she held in the party, triggering speculations on whether she had severed her ties with the party for all practical purposes. A former minister in the erstwhile Mamata Banerjee government in charge of key departments like Finance and Health as Minister of state, and a prominent leader of the party who led its women's wing Bhattacharya also withdrew herself as the party's authorised signatory of its accounts maintained in various banks and as Mamata Banerjee's authorised point person to appear before the Election Commission. Bhattacharya was named stat
West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari on Monday announced that a draft Uniform Civil Code (UCC) bill will be placed before the state cabinet on July 2. Announcing this in the assembly, Adhikari said that former Supreme Court judge Ranjana Prakash Desai will head a committee that will formulate the UCC bill. The bill will be tabled in the assembly later, he said. The proposed legislation seeks to establish a common civil framework governing marriage, divorce, inheritance and adoption irrespective of religion.
A bill to curb anti-social activities with a stringent provision of preventive detention for up to 12 months without trial was tabled in the West Bengal assembly on Monday. The West Bengal Public Safety and Control of Anti-social Activities Bill, 2026, is aimed at preventing riots and other forms of violence, Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari said in the House. Explaining the rationale behind introducing the bill, Adhikari said the existing laws do not have the provision to recover the cost for property destruction from those involved in violence, directly or otherwise. The bill is targeted at goondas and won't be misused in any manner, including for political purposes, the CM assured the House.
Fusion CX, a multinational customer experience and business process solutions provider, said it will invest Rs 100 crore over the next three years to set up an IT and ITeS campus at the Bengal Silicon Valley Tech Hub in New Town near Kolkata. The Kolkata-headquartered company said it has secured 1.06 acres of land in Action Area II for the proposed project, which will house an 11-storeyed facility with a built-up area of around 2 lakh square feet. The upcoming campus is expected to generate employment for more than 9,000 people at full capacity and further strengthen West Bengal as Fusion CX's largest offshore delivery cluster. "West Bengal offers a lot of potential. We are hopeful that the new government will make the investment climate conducive. We will invest around Rs 100 crore over the next three years in this facility. The campus has the potential to generate employment for more than 9,000 people at full capacity," Fusion CX co-founder, managing director and CEO Pankaj Dhanuk
The battle over West Bengal's political future may have ended, but one of the assembly poll campaign's most emotive themes has resurfaced in school kitchens. The BJP government's decision to engage ISKCON to provide cooked mid-day meals in schools under the Kolkata Municipal Corporation area and replace eggs with vegetarian alternatives has reopened a wider debate over nutrition, culture and identity. The move revived memories of the poll-season clash when fish became a political symbol, and the TMC accused the BJP of seeking to impose a vegetarian cultural template on West Bengal. Presenting the state's first budget after the BJP's victory in the assembly polls, Finance Minister Swapan Dasgupta announced that the material cost for primary school mid-day meals would be increased from Rs 6.78 to Rs 10 per student and that ISKCON would be entrusted with supplying cooked meals under a pilot project in the KMC area. The enhanced allocation was welcomed across the political spectrum. Bu
The West Bengal government declared July 6 a public holiday across the state to mark the 125th birth anniversary of Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee, a notification said. The Finance Department notification, issued on Thursday, said the holiday has been declared to observe the birth anniversary of Mookerjee, described as "one of the most illustrious sons of this state". In a separate memorandum, the state announced a half-day holiday on July 1 on the occasion of Doctors' Day, which is observed every year to commemorate the birth anniversary of former West Bengal chief minister Dr Bidhan Chandra Roy. It said all state government offices, educational institutions, urban and local bodies, corporations, undertakings and grant-in-aid institutions under the control of the West Bengal government will remain closed from 2 pm on July 1. The order, however, said the Offices of the Registrar of Assurances, Kolkata, and the Collector of Stamp Revenue, Kolkata, would remain exempt from the half-day ..
West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari on Thursday said nine people have died and 20 others were injured when an under-construction warehouse collapsed in Kolkata's Taratala area a day ago. In a statement in the Assembly, he announced Rs 10 lakh compensation for the families of each deceased and Rs one lakh for each injured in the incident. Of the 20 injured, one is in critical condition, and four are in serious condition, the chief minister said. Stating that five people have been arrested in connection with the warehouse collapse at Transport Depot Road in west Kolkata, Adhikari asserted that no one will be spared. He said that former mayor and minister Firhad Hakim's signature appears on the building plan of the collapsed warehouse. A day earlier, the chief minister said that preliminary inputs received from Kolkata Municipal Corporation engineers suggested that there were defects in the building plan approved for the warehouse. He has suspended till July 31 the work of a
The Asian Development Bank has offered financial assistance to the West Bengal government for developing infrastructure to support industrial growth in the state, a senior official at the state secretariat said on Wednesday. The proposal came when an Asian Development Bank (ADB) delegation met a top bureaucrat at the Chief Minister's Office on Tuesday, a day after the state budget was presented, he said. "ADB has indicated its willingness to support the state in building economic regions that can improve industrial connectivity, logistics and urban infrastructure. Discussions are at a preliminary stage, but the proposals are significant," a senior bureaucrat at Nabanna told PTI. It has expressed interest in extending loans for a range of infrastructure projects, including the development of City Economic Regions (CERs), logistics hubs and tourism-related facilities in the state, he said. ADB has proposed the creation of two City Economic Regions in West Bengal. One would cover ...