Mamata Banerjee named among 100 most influential people by Time magazine

New Delhi: Time magazine has listed West Bengal chief minister and Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee in its list of 100 most influential people of the world.

Banerjee joins a club of "people who inspire us, entertain us, challenge us and change our world." The Time 100 list comprises people from all walks of life - politicians, cartoonists, actors, athletes and sportspersons, artists, authors.

The 2012 list includes Syrian cartoonist Ali Ferzat, US president Barack Obama, billionaire investor Warren Buffet, Pakistan's first Oscar winner Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy, US secretary of state Hillary Clinton, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, US supreme court associate Justice Anthony Kennedy. In 2010, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh figured in the list.

Time said Mamata is described by her critics as a "mercurial oddball and a shrieking street fighter," however, what she has proved to be is a 'consummate politician'. "Banerjee, 57, spent years struggling on the margins, her Trinamool Congress Party a feisty rabble compared with the leviathan of West Bengal's communists...

Through successive elections, Banerjee steadily expanded her power base while chipping away at those of her opponents," the Time magazine, which released its 2012 list of the 100 most influential people in the world on Wednesday, said.

Time's gushing praise notwithstanding, the domestic criticism for Mamata continued. Press Council of India chairperson Justice Markandey Katju castigated Mamata for the arrest of Jadavpur University professor. Katju said Banerjee "must learn to grow up now" and she was no longer a street fighter.