Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Friday said India and West Bengal cannot be safe unless the country’s borders are secured, alleging that the previous Mamata Banerjee government delayed the allocation of land needed for fencing along the India-Bangladesh border.
Addressing a programme at the Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB) frontier headquarters in Siliguri, Shah said 1,129 acres of land had been sought since 2014 to strengthen border security but was provided only after the Suvendu Adhikari government came to power.
"My desperate pleas to Mamata Banerjee for land to set up border fences by the BSF fell on deaf ears. I had been asking for 1,129 acres of land to strengthen border security since 2014. We received the land parcel only after the Adhikari government was formed in the state," Shah said.
Shah also congratulated West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari for attending an SSB programme, saying previous chief ministers had not participated in such events.
He said the SSB was not a political organisation and added that the absence of previous chief ministers from programmes of border guarding forces sent a wrong signal.
Shah also criticised successive governments for failing to give due recognition to the national song Vande Mataram after Independence.
"The complete version of Vande Mataram was never sung in India until at the Red Fort during the Independence Day celebrations this year. It gives me solace that the nation has finally recognised the song on the 150th year of its creation by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay," he added.
(With Inputs from PTI)