Communists are conspiring against the railways: Mamata

September 29th, 2009 KOLKATA - Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee Tuesday stepped in to bail out some of the passengers stranded due to the Air India pilots' strike. She arranged for special trains on various routes and asked union Minister of State for Shipping Mukul Roy to run an additional service of the Shipping Corporation of India Wednesday to bring back the air passengers stranded in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

September 12th, 2009 KOLKATA - Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee Saturday said that her ministry has already begun an austerity drive and taken several cost-cutting measures to reduce additional expenditure. "I'd issued an order to cut all additional expenditure and it's already been implemented in the railways," Banerjee said while flagging off two new trains -- Sealdah-Ajmirsharif Express and Farakka-Nabadwip Express -- from Sealdah station here.

August 21st, 2009 KOLKATA - The expert committee, set up by Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee to explore ways to promote partnership between the railways and industries, will submit its initial report next week, committee chairman Amit Mitra said here Friday. "The opportunities that are there in the form of low hanging fruits have been identified (in the report)," Mitra, also the secretary-general of the Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (FICCI), said during an interactive session between Banerjee and industrialists.

August 20th, 2009 KOLKATA - Rubbishing talk that efforts are on to privatise the Indian Railways, Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee Thursday said she would be the last person to do so. "In some quarters there is mischievous talk that we are trying to privatise the railways.

August 12th, 2009 KOLKATA - Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee Wednesday named an Eastern Railway (ER) open theatre after Bengali theatre icon Sambhu Mitra and sanctioned Rs.35 million for the overall development of the amphitheatre as a cultural platform in Kolkata's twin district Howrah. "Indian Railways have at least 1.4 million staff and we've schools, colleges for the children of our employees.

August 5th, 2009 KOLKATA - The West Bengal government Wednesday requested Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee to hand over the excess railway land to the state government for developing small and medium-scale industries. "We, on behalf of the department for state cottage and small-scale industries, sent a letter to Mamata Banerjee, requesting her to hand over the excess land of the railways to the state government.

July 11th, 2009 NEW DELHI - The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Saturday said the country was awaiting the white paper promised by Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee on the railways' performance in the last five years. Banerjee told parliament July 3 that she would come out with a white paper on the actual performance of the railways in the past five years when Lalu Prasad headed the ministry.

July 9th, 2009 NEW DELHI - Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee Thursday said her ministry would look at providing infrastructure and land for setting up Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs). "We might even look at building IITs in the future," Banerjee told the Lok Sabha in a discussion on the railway budget.

July 7th, 2009 NEW DELHI - The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Tuesday asked Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee "not to make Indian Railways an East India Company and alleged that the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government has favoured West Bengal at the cost of many other states in the rail budget. "India is not (West) Bengal.

July 7th, 2009 NEW DELHI - Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Arun Jaitley Tuesday criticised Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee for taking the Indian Railways into "non-core areas", and said that will threaten its economical and social viability. "The fundamental principle of any efficient management is to concentrate on core area of competence and ignore all non-essential and non-core activities," Jaitley said while participating in a discussion on the railway budget in the Rajya Sabha.

July 3rd, 2009 NEW DELHI - Praising Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee's budget Friday, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said she had done a "very competent job" and had not just ensured that there was no burden on the passengers but also taken care of their safety. Banerjee had done a "very competent job in a short period of time.

July 3rd, 2009 KOLKATA - Terming it a "mixed' railway budget, West Bengal's ruling Left Front chairman Biman Bose criticised the privatisation schemes introduced in the new budgetary plans by Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee Friday. "It's a mixed budget and the thrust is on more and more privatisation.

June 7th, 2009 KOLKATA - Railway passengers should be more vigilant about their own security while commuting, Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee said Sunday night. "People, mainly the railway commuters, should be more vigilant about the security matter.

May 26th, 2009 KOLKATA - Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee, who broke convention Tuesday to take charge of her portfolio here instead of the national capital, identified the speedy completion of eastern freight corridor as being crucial to her scheme of things. "The eastern freight corridor between Kolkata and Ludhiana is very important and will be completed very soon," said Banerjee, adding: "It's very important for the development of four states - West Bengal, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Punjab." Also, the Bihar-Howrah express train, which was renamed as Kandari Express, will be made a daily train.

March 14th, 2009 KOLKATA - The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Friday fielded a woman candidate against Mamata Banerjee for the Lok Sabha's Kolkata South seat after Trinamool Congress snapped ties with the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) to team up with the Congress in West Bengal. BJP sources here said the party's state Mahila Morcha (women's wing) president Jyotsna Banerjee has been nominated for the prestigious constituency.