BJP demands white paper on Mamata Banerjee's Singapore trip

KOLKATA: The BJP on Saturday demanded that the West Bengal government issue a white paper on chief minister Mamata Banerjee's maiden foreign visit to Singapore. Led by Banerjee and finance minister Amit Mitra, a delegation comprising a host of bureaucrats and entrepreneurs visited Singapore for five-days from August 17 mainly to attract investment for the state.

"This visit was not to secure investment, rather it was a holiday trip. So for the sake of the common man, we demand the state government immediately issue a white paper giving details of who were part of the visit, who funded it and what amount of investments did the government secure," said state BJP president Rahul Sinha.

He made it clear that they will force the state government to bring out a white paper on the chief minister’s visit. "If the government does not release the white paper, we will resort to Right to Information (RTI) Act, to compel the government to divulge detail information about the visit," Sinha said.

Meanwhile, industrialist Shishir Bajoria, who was a member of the Communist Party of India-Marxist, formally joined the BJP earlier in the day.