Mamata sees role of ‘highly loaded virus’ behind Kumar Mangalam Birla skipping factory opening

PTI, KOLKATA, OCT 8, 2025: Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday hinted that industrialist Kumar Mangalam Birla’s decision to skip the inauguration of a paint manufacturing facility of his group by her might have been influenced by external pressure. Birla, chairman of the Aditya Birla Group, was scheduled to attend the inauguration ceremony in Kharagpur on Thursday. However, he sent a message to the Chief Minister telling her that he is cancelling the visit because of health issues.

"I said in a press conference yesterday that I would inaugurate the Birla Opus factory, which is now complete. Within half an hour, I got a message. A letter citing health problem and apologising for cancelling the programme was sent to me," Mamata said, while speaking to journalists at Kolkata airport on her return from flood and landslide-hit areas of north Bengal. "I do not blame him. I think this is the work of a highly loaded virus that threatens everyone," she said. Though she did not elaborate further, it appears that she implied that political pressure led Birla to skip the event.

The Chief Minister on Wednesday sharpened her attack against Union Home Minister Amit Shah by alleging that the BJP leader's actions were like those of an "acting Prime Minister." Speaking to reporters outside the Kolkata airport after her return from flood-ravaged north Bengal, Mamata said she wanted to urge Prime Minister Narendra Modi not to repose too much faith in Shah, who "may one day become his Mir Zafar." She was referring to the 18th-century military general of Bengal who betrayed Nawab Siraj ud Daulah in the Battle of Plassey and later became the monarch with the help of the British.

The TMC supremo accused the BJP top brass of manipulating the Election Commission into conducting the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in poll-bound states. Mamata said: "Their leader holds a meeting and comes here to say that he will delete several lakh names from the voters' list of Bengal. Tell me, we are currently reeling under natural calamities, heavy rains, celebrating festivals and soon. Can the SIR exercise be completed within a fortnight and can fresh names be uploaded in that period under the current circumstances?" Mamata questioned whether the ECI should act at the behest of the BJP party, or should it act in the interest of democratic rights and civil rights of the people? "All this is a game played by Amit Shah."