'Would have slapped if...': Mamata Banerjee rebukes magistrate for siphoning off funds

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday rebuked the Purulia district magistrate for siphoning off funds.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday slammed Purulia District Magistrate (DM) Rahul Majumdar after receiving complaints of revenue siphoning collected from brick kilns by "unknown collection agents."

Mamata said: "DM, are you listening to the complaints? The lower-level officers in your administration are eating up the funds collected. This is not done by Trinamool Congress party men. What are you doing? How are you running the administration in this district?

"If this was done by one of my party members, I would have given him a tight slap. I am giving so much to the people, they still need so much. Why have people grown so greedy these days?" Banerjee said.

She was speaking during an administrative review meeting at Rabindra Bhavana in West Bengal's Purulia district.

Addressing the people there, she stated, "I believe we [TMC] made some mistakes, which is why people did not vote for us and instead voted for the BJP in the last MP and MLA elections."

She did, however, criticise the BJP government, saying, "After 8 years of BJP rule, they have only given us 40 per cent of the money collected as taxes, and they have not paid us for 100 days of work. You [BJP] do not deserve to remain in power if you don't pay our dues. We will protest against this on June 5 and 6."

In an attack on the BJP government over gas prices and demonetisation, she asked attendees at the meeting, "Are you getting the benefits of the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana?"