Mamata Banerjee asks what SEBI was doing; attacks Chidambaram

With Rahul Gandhi targeting her government for inaction on the Saradha ponzi scam, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee today questioned what SEBI was doing and also targeted Union Finance Minister P Chidamabaram.

Malda: With Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi targeting her government for inaction on the Saradha ponzi scam, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee today questioned what SEBI was doing and also targeted Union Finance Minister P Chidamabaram.

"These money making companies had surfaced and thrived during the Left Front regime. What was SEBI doing then?" Banerjee asked at an election rally here.
"Now there are clamours for a CBI probe. You can ask the CBI to investigate. Is this because I keep on protesting every time?" she said.
"The Trinamool government stands for transparency, accountability, and integrity. For that reason, we had arrested one person (Saradha Group chairman Sudipta Sen) and also sent one one of our MPs (Kunal Ghosh) to jail after arresting him," she said, referring to the action taken by her government after the ponzi bubble burst.
Targeting Chidambaram, she said that he had ruined the country.
"The Congress finance minister has ruined the country. Tell him not to conspire. He is not fighting the polls this time for fear of losing," she said.
"With elections coming, it is being said that TMC should be caught. If I am found guilty, then arrest me and send me to jail," Banerjee said.
Reiterating her criticism of a media house in the state without naming it, she said, "What cheek do they have to talk when their newspapers and programmes were supported by advertisements of these companies."
Banerjee also claimed that her government`s efforts to take action against these companies were also negated by the Centre. "In the last three years, we passed a Bill in the Assembly to rein in these companies. But the Bill was returned twice by the Centre. What do they have to say now?" Banerjee asked. The Congress, she claimed, was destined to be voted out of power.