West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee Friday said the terror attack in J&K on a CRPF convoy at Pulwama which claimed 40 lives was due to “intelligence failure” and demanded that there be three-day nationwide mourning to show respect to the slain jawans.
She questioned why the Centre was not declaring national mourning for the CRPF jawans and said “Will mourning take place only when political leaders die?”
“I demand 72 hours mourning for the ultimate sacrifice of the soldiers. At least for national respect. Only one flag is not enough for it,” she told reporters after returning from New Delhi.
Banerjee said that the government as well as all the political parties should put a stop to all scheduled programme in view of the terror attack.
“I am sorry to see that the prime minister inaugurated one project today. After any serious incident takes place, we should avoid political programmes and government programmes. Why have they (Centre) not declared a three-day mourning?
Describing the attack as “the biggest” one after the Uri terror attack in 2016 and said that people should not do politics with it.
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“We do not want to do politics with this incident that is why we did not say anything. Not only us but all the other partyies who belong to the opposition have not said anything on this. All we said is that we stand by our countrymen,” she said.
“We(TMC) want to express all solidarity to the countrymen and our jawans. I salute my jawans. This (Pulwama attack) is an unfortunate incident.
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Questioning the role of the national security adviser, she said “We have the right to know what had actually happened. What was the national security adviser doing?
“Why did we not come to know anything before the attack? Why did so many jawans get killed? These are the questions of the people not only mine,” she said.
“This is actually an intelligence failure. I have spoken to many jawans whom I know. They also said that it was a complete intelligence failure. Why were so many vehicles going together?,” she asked.
Banerjee also demanded stringent action against the terrorists behind Thursday’s attack on the jawans.
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“Let us have a very sensitive inquiry to find out who were involved. We must take stringent action against the culprits. We demand strong action. So many soldiers died, it will demoralise other jawans,” she said.
On the Centre calling for a parliamentary party meeting Saturday, Banerjee said, “I do not understand why they have called it instead of political parties … Specially now when the Lok Sabha is over … I doubt that they have got some feedback.”
TMC MP Sudip Bandyopadhyay will go to New Delhi Saturday morning for the parliamentary party meeting, she said.
The chief minister said that she spoke to the family members of one CPRF jawan who died in the attack.
Via The Indian Express
