Vajpayee visit unites Trinamul, BJP leaders

kolkata: one visit by the prime minister was enough to unite the warring trinamul congress and the state bjp factions. senior leaders from the two parties even vowed before atal behari vajpayee to bury their differences and work together for the 2003 panchayat polls. trinamul congress leader mamata banerjee and state bjp president ashim ghosh, alongwith pankaj banerjee, sudip bandyopadhyay and muzaffar khan took a delegation to vajpayee at raj bhavan on saturday morning.senior bjp leader tapan sikdar, however, was not present in the delegation. much of the heart-burn between the trinamul and bjp had generated from sikdar's strident criticisms of banerjee's style of functioning. the trinamul congress, on the other hand, had alleged that sikdar was close to the cpm. there was some unpleasantness at raj bhavan when mamata resented the way her bag was searched by the kolkata police personnel. all she had was a side bag which she has been carrying all her life, bandyopadhyay. the trinamul congress and bjp leaders wanted the centre to take steps against the left front government on the adverse reports made by the comptroller and auditor general. they also wanted the centre to step in to prevent ill-treatment of people coming for shelter in the state from bangladesh after the elections there. the trinamul leaders also sought assistance from the centre for the development of west bengal. later bandyopadhyay hinted that mamata did not like the idea of the prime minister visiting a housing complex set up by a businessman close to the cpm. she had accompanied the prime minister only to santiniketan.