Leaders like Sonia are high class people: Mamata

Discounting popular notion, Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee on Thursday said she was not the only leader in the party as being projected in the media.

"Sonia Gandhi is also leader of the Congress, but nobody talks about her because leaders like her are high class people," she said at a panel discussion during presentation of the Statesman Rural reporting Awards in Kolkata.

In an apparent reference to the Congress leader, Banerjee said she was lucky in that she was not a member of a family that runs a political party.

"I have no family member for the party who has someone's backing. My party is a big family. My party is from the grassroots."

Speaking over the topic 'Bengal cannot carry the baggage of her past', she said Bengal will have a political change, but the job was tough.

She alleged that the CPI-M "goons" were terrorising innocent people to be able to stick to power. "We do not want to retaliate," she asserted.

On the Maoist problem, she said there should be a proper strategy to tackle the menace. In the name of tacking the problems, innocent people are being tortured in the Jangalmahal, she alleged.

She said there should be no forceful land acquisition and negotiation should be the means to acquire land for industry.
For acquiring land for railway projects, employment will be given to a member of the family whose land would be acquired in addition to adequate compensation.