Midnapore (also written as Medinipur and Midnapur. Bangla: মেদিনীপুর, , IAST: medinipur) is a town in West Bengal, India. The city is the headquarters of, and gives its name to, the Paschim Medinipur district of the state of West Bengal. The town also gives its name to a subdivision of the district.

The town used to be belong to the Midnapore District until the Partition of Midnapore. The undivided Midnapore district had been, at one time, the largest district in West Bengal and indeed, all of India.

The town has a population of c. 150,000 according to the 2001 census. It is situated on the banks of the Kangsabati River (variously known as Kasai and Cossye). On the opposite bank of the river is the industrial and railway hub Kharagpur.

Etymology

There are conflicting accounts of how the name Medinipur came to be. One account claims that Medinipur was named after a local deity "Medinimata" (literally "mother of the world", a Shakti incarnation). Another account claims that Midnapur was so named because in the heyday the number of mosques rivalled those in Medina.

History

A number of prehistoric sites of great interest are being excavated throughout the West Midnapore district. In ancient times the region seems to be highly influenced by Jainism and Buddhism. Coins issued by Samudragupta have been found in the near vicinity of the town. Originally this region belongs to the Kalinga (ancient Orissa) empire. The kingdom of Shashanka and Harshavardhana also included part of undivided Midnapore in their kingdom. However, the most significant archaeological site in the region is the bustling port of Tamralipta near present-day Tamluk, a site noted in the travelogues of Fa Hien and Hiuen Tsang. Later Chaitanya passed through the area on his way from Puri to Varanasi as documented in the Chaitanya Charitamrita.After the fall of last independent Hindu dynasty of Kalinga-Utkala, Gajapati Mukunda Deva in 16th century this region was came under one of the five Sarkars of Mughalbandi Orissa i.e. Jaleswar Sarkar which was ruled by the Subehdar of Orissa.The north boundary of Jalshwar was Tamluk and south was Soro and Dhalbhumgarh in the west to the Bay of Bengal in the east. Bahadur Khan was the ruler of Jaleshwar Sarkar or Hijli (including Midnapore) during the time of Shah Jehan. He was defeated by Shah Shuja, the second son of Shah Jehan, then the subshdar of Bengal.

During the era of the Muslim rulers of Bengal nawab Alivardi Khan's general Mir Jafar fought successfully against Mir Habib's lieutenant Sayyid Nur near Midnapore town in 1746. This was part of his campaign to regain Orissa and thwart the Maratha attacks on Bengal. Mir Habib came up from Balasore and was joined by the Marathas, but Mir Jafar fled to Burdwan leaving Mir Habib to retake Midnapore with ease. Alivardi defeated Janoji Bhosle, a Maratha cheftain in a severely contested battle near Burdwan in 1747 and Janoji fled to Midnapore. The Marathas held on to Orissa including Midnapore until 1749 when it was reconquered by Alivardi. The Marathas continued to raid Midnapore which proved disastrous for the residents.

In 1756 Alivardi died and his successor was Siraj-ud-daulah. On June 20, 1757, he was betrayed by Mir Jafar to the East India Company under the command of Lord Robert Clive at Plassey. This consolidated the Company's hold on Bengal and Orissa (along with Midnapore). The district of Midnapore which included Dhalbhum or Ghatshila, now in Singhbhum, Jharkhand was annexed in 1760 along with Burdwan and Chittagong both handed over to the East India Company by Mir Qasim. The last free king of Dhalbhum was imprisoned in Midnapore town.

Some of the Malla kings of Mallabhum in the Bankura district held land in northern Midnapore district, while the Raj rules of Narajole, Jhargram, Lalgarh, Jamboni, and Chandrakona held sway in their local areas. The Raj rulers in Rajasthan would pay homage to Jagannath but carves out their own territories under the supremacy of the Hindu empires of Orissa.

Midnapore is notable for its contribution in the history of Indian freedom movement since it has produced many martyrs. During the British Raj the town became a centre of revolutionary activities, such as the Santal Revolt (1766–1767) and the Chuar Revolt (1799). The Zilla School, now known as Midnapore Collegiate School was the birthplace of many extremist activities. Teachers like Hemchandra Kanungo inspired and guided the pupils to participate in the Indian Freedom Movement. Three British District Magistrates were assassinated in succession by the revolutionaries Bimal Dasgupta, Jyothi Jibon Ghosh, Pradoot Bhattacharya, Prabhakangsu Pal, Mrigan Dutta, Anath Bandhu Panja, Ramkrishna Roy, Braja Kishor Chakraborty, Nirmal Jibon Ghosh. Khudiram Bose and Satyendranath Basu were some of the young men that liad down their lives for the freedom of India. Kazi Nazrul Islam attended political meetings in Midnapore in the 1920s. Raja Narendra Lal Khan, ruler of Narajole, who donated his palace for Midnapore's first college for women, had been implicated, (although it turned out to be false) for planting a bomb. Khudiram Bose was born in the Habibpur in 1889 and studied at Midnapore Collegiate School up to the eight standard. He was first caught by a policeman for distributing seditious leaflets in Midnapore in 1906. He was an anarchist and protested against the moderate policies of Surendranath Banerjea. Khudiram was sentenced to death for a failed attempt to kill Magistrate Kingsford. Satyendranath was executed on the 21st November 1908. Noted freedom-fighter and Bengal Province Congress Committee President Birendranath Sasmal practiced at the Midnapore High Court.

Rishi Rajnarayan Basu, one-time tutor of Rabindranath Tagore, Asia's first Nobel Prize winner, was headmaster of the Zila School in 1850. He founded a girls' school, a night school for workers, and a public library. The Rajnarayan Basu Pathagar library is still in existence near Golkuar Chowk.

Not only Hindu activists, but also Muslim statesmen originated or spent time in Midnapore. Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy founder of the Awami League, a prominent political party in Bangladesh, and the fifth Prime Minister of Pakistan hailed from a prominent family of Midnapore.

Climate and geography

district showing Midnapore]] Midnapore is located at and is 23 metres above sea-level.

The climate follows a hot tropical monsoon weather pattern. Summers last from April to mid-June with diurnal highs ranging from the upper 30s°C to the mid 40s°C and lows in the low 30s°C. Daily heat is often followed by evening rains known as kalboishakhis or dust-storms (loo). Monsoon rains can last from mid-June to late August or even September with rains from the southeast monsoon contributing the lions-share of the annual rainfall of around 1500 mm. Winters last for 2 to 3 months and are mild; typical lows are from 8 °C - 14 °C. Allergies are common in winter and spring due to the high content of particulate dust in the air.

Soils near the Kangsabati River are alluvial with a high-degree of clay or sand, whereas soils towards Rangamati are lateritic. Vegetation incluces eucalyptus and sal forests on the northwest side of town. The sal forests form part of the Dalma Bengal-Jharkhand Range. Arabari, the forest range which was the site of India's first Joint Forest Management scheme, is only 30 km away. Elephant attacks on humans are common in this area, although the town itself has never been attacked. Hordes of marauding elephants attacking human habitation in villages in Midnapore district have come as close to the town as Gurguripal, 6 km away.

Transportation

Train

Midnapore is connected not only to larger cities in the region, but also to smaller towns and villages in the district. Midnapore Railway Station is on the Howrah and

express train routes.Many local and passenger trains ply all day between Howrah and Midnapore as well as Adra and Midnapore.Apart from these local trains,Many major express trains also pass through Midnapore including the Delhi-Puri Nilachal Express, Howrah-Lokmanya Tilak Samarsatta Express, Puri-Patna Express, Ernakulam-Patna Express and New Delhi-Bhubaneswar Rajdhani Expess.Midnapore is close to Kharagpur, a major hub of the South Eastern Railway is 13 kilometres.

At present the Midnapore Railway Section is undergoing a development process.The station complex is undergoing modernisation.The platforms are being increased in length.Work is in process to double the railway line between Kharagpur Jn. and Midnapore. Apart from an existing railway bridge on the Kangsabati river,a new double line railway bridge is under construction on the river to smoothen the railway traffic on this route,as more no. of trains are going to come up on this railway route.This railway bridge is expected to be completed by the end of this year.

Bus

A bus terminus serves the greater Midnapore area, and there are many bus routes to smaller towns in the nearby districts.

Local transportation

Selected thoroughfares of Midnapore have been expanded and maintained in an ongoing "Megacity" project started in 1997. The vast majority of roads are in a state of disrepair. Some of the smaller roads in the town are unpaved and are usable during and after the monsoon months. To compound the problems faced by inhabitants there are a limited number of bridges crossing the Kasai river affording entry from Howrah and Kolkata. Nevertheless the ongoing construction of the new interstate highway system which passes by Midnapore has reduced the time it takes for inhabitants to reach Kolkata. A set of traffic control signals was recently installed in the city, and this helps control traffic. Motorized and bicycle traffic has been increasing in recent years. Within the city, cycle rickshaws are one of the few modes of public transportation since effective lobbying by rickshaw-pullers who depend on this for their livelihood has prevented the introduction of town buses and auto rickshaws.

Infrastructure and economy

Electricity is available, although as in the rest of West Bengal, demand exceeds supply. Power outages are common in the summer and monsoon months, although outages lasting more than an hour are becoming rarer. Most businesses and upper middle-class and rich households have backup generators and batteries that they use in times of outages.

Water is a scarce resource in Midnapore. Most of the water comes from the Kasai river, which is shrinking in size every year due to over-exploitation. The municipal water supply is free but not ample; tap water is available for about an hour twice a day and is stored by those who can,,in plastic, metal, or concrete reservoirs or in buckets. The water is of questionable purity prompting the proliferation of individual water purification units.

Sewage disposal is another concern. Many of the lower income-communities in the town do not have adequate plumbing and must rely on refuse-collectors to haul out human waste. Not all drains are covered, causing a proliferation of disease causing flies and mosquitoes. Since Midnapore is drier than many other coastal and humid low-lying towns of West Bengal, this problem is not as acute as it.

Internet Services

Internet service has improved many folds compared to last 5 yrs. BSNL is the sole government sourced provider and the local hub is in Kharagpur. Broadband is available to the public and dialup service, which is touted at 100MB/s,so a pure speed of 2-8 MB/s is gained.There are many cyber cafe(s) spread all over the town which proide high speed internet services for the people.

Possession of PCs is becoming very common at homes and many business firms,so usage of internet has also gained a high peak.Besides the broadband services provided by BSNL,internet usage is also done by dial-up connections provided by the private operators such as AIRBRIDGE WIRELESS BROADBAND, AIRTEL,RELIANCE,AIRCEL and all the other private mobile operators providing mobile services in the town.

Plug-to-surf services are also being provided by some of the operators such as BSNL,TATA,RELIANCE etc.. The internet services are expected to improve more in the coming yrs with more high speed and availability of broadband services by the private operators.

Demographics

India census, Medinipur had a population of 153,349. Medinipur has an average literacy rate of 75%, higher than the national average of 59.5%: male literacy is 80%, and female literacy is 71%. In Medinipur, 10% of the population is under 6 years of age.

This makes it the second largest town in Paschim Medinipur district after Kharagpur. The town is almost equally divided in terms of population between Hindus and Muslims. The multiple mosques and temples, many predating British rule serve as indication of how co-prevalent the two religions are in this area. It is an important religious spot for the Muslims of India and Bangladesh. Even though the interesting religious mixture would suggest religious tensions, remarkably Midnapore has never witnessed major Hindu-Muslim tensions in recent history.

As per 2001 census, Midnapore CD Block had a population of 157,584, out of which 80,824 were males and 76,760 were females. Growth of population in the 1991-2001 decade was 26.77 per cent.

Economy

The economy of the undivided district, according to 1991 and 2001 census statistics, was overwhelmingly agrarian. Being a district town, Midnapore functioned in an ancillary role for the rural district as an administrative and judicial centre. As such many businesses and services revolved around this role, which naturally, has been adversely affected by the division of the district. Midnapore still fills this role and has more physicians, lawyers, teachers, banks, and administrative offices than any other town in either East or West Midnapore district. The medical sector is thriving with the addition of a Medical college and the Vidyasagar Institute of Health Application. Coaching centres that assist students enrolled in the regular and correspondence courses of Vidyasagar University are also common.

Poorer segments of this semi-rural society are involved in transportation, basic agriculture, small shops and manual labour for construction work.

Civic affairs

Midnapore is a municipality with 24 wards and 94,738 registered voters (2003 statistics). For a long period of 32 years, it was under the control of the Left Front, in 2009 Trinamool Congress won the municiplaity by a margin of 2 wards.

Culture

Historic attractions

) temple, Karnagarh]]

The Jagannath Temple at Nutan Bazar was built in 1851, possibly at the request of a descendant of the Ganga dynasty of Orissa.. Other temples from the eighteenth century include the Hanuman-jeu Temple in Mirzabazar, the Sitala temple at Barabazar, and the Habibpur Kali Temple.

Midnapore assembly constituency is part of Midnapore (Lok Sabha constituency).

Notes

References

Map of old Medinipur district (district has now been split)

Vidyasagar University

Midnapore College

Midnapur Medical College in MCI site

Reference to URS in recent media

Daily news section for Midnapore district and Midnapore town in popular Bengali daily. Note page is in Bengali text

Excellent resource on the temples of Midnapore

March 27, 2006 Outlook feature on Pathra's temples and their restoration efforts

Account of early history of Midnapore during the Maratha raids

A history book that includes an interesting account of what it was like to be English in Midnapore during the days of the Raj

Biography of Rajnarayan Basu

Biography of freedom-fighter Birendranath Sasmal

External links

Website medinipur.com

Website midnapore.in

Official district page

For viewing images of Medinipur visit http://medinipur.com/category/209-views-of-medinipur.html

Category:Cities and towns in Paschim Medinipur district Category:Community Development Blocks in Paschim Medinipur district

Coordinates	55°45′06″N37°37′04″N
Name	Mamata Banerjee মমতা বন্দ্যোপাধ্যায়
Alt	Portrait of Mamata Banerjee
Office	11th Chief Minister of West Bengal
Term start	20 May 2011
Predecessor	Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee
Governor	M. K. Narayanan
Office2	Minister of Railways
Term start2	22 May 2009
Term end2	19 May 2011
Predecessor2	Lalu Prasad Yadav
Successor2	Manmohan Singh (pro tem)
Office3	Member of Parliament
Term start3	1991
Predecessor3	Biplab Dasgupta
Birth date	January 05, 1955
Birth place	Kolkata, West Bengal, India
Nationality	Indian
Spouse	Unmarried
Party	Indian National Congress (1970–1997) Trinamool Congress (1997–present)
Residence	Harish Chatterjee Street, Kolkata, West Bengal, India
Alma mater	University of Calcutta
Profession	PoliticianAdvocateSocial Worker
Religion	Hindu
Signature	Signature of Mamata Banerjee.svg
Website	Mamata Banerjee

Mamata Banerjee (, ; born 5 January 1955) is the 11th and current Chief Minister of the Indian state of West Bengal. She is the first woman to hold the office and is also the founding chairperson of the Trinamool Congress. Currently she is also in charge of nine key departments of the Government of West Bengal, including Home, Health and Family Welfare, Land and Land Reforms, Information and Cultural Affairs, Hill Affairs, Minority Affairs and Madrassah Education, Agriculture, Power and Home (Personnel and Administrative Reforms departments. Noted as a firebrand orator and popularly known as "Didi" (meaning the elder sister) to all her followers.

Banerjee pulled off a landslide victory for the All India Trinamul Congress in West Bengal by defeating the world's longest-serving democratically-elected communist government, the Communist Party of India (Marxist)-led Left Front government, bringing to an end 34 years of Left Front rule in the state. Banerjee previously served as a Minister of Railways twice, Minister of Coal once, and Minister of State for Human Resource Development, Department of Youth Affairs and Sports and Women and Child Development once in the cabinet of the Government of India. She opposed forceful land acquisition for industrialization by the then communist government in West Bengal for Special Economic Zones at the cost of agriculturalists and farmers.

She graduated with an honours degree in History from the Jogamaya Devi College, an undergraduate women's college in southern Kolkata. Later she earned a master's degree in Islamic History from the University of Calcutta. This was followed by a degree in education from the Shri Shikshayatan College. Later, she earned a law degree from the Jogesh Chandra Chaudhuri Law College, Kolkata.

Early political career

In the West Bengal Assembly elections of 2011, Trinamool Congress and congress parties combined, spearheaded by Mamata Banerjee successfully won with over 77% of the total seats. This is considered a historic victory over the Left Front rule. She is the 11th Chief Minister and first woman chief Minister of the state. The highlight of the election was that only four ministers out of the twenty eight of the outgoing regime were able to retain their seats. Even the outgoing Chief Minister Mr Buddhadev Bhattacharya lost in his own constituency.

Indian National Congress

She started her political career with Congress(I), and as a young woman in the 1970s, she quickly rose in the ranks of the local Congress group, and remained the General Secretary of Mahila Congress (I), West Bengal, from 1976 to 1980. In the 1984 general election, she became one of India's youngest parliamentarians ever, beating veteran Communist politician Somnath Chatterjee, from the Jadavpur parliamentary Constituency in West Bengal. She also became the General-Secretary of the All India Youth Congress. Losing her seat in 1989 in an anti-Congress wave, she was back in 1991 general elections, having settled into the Calcutta South constituency. She retained the Kolkata South seat in the 1996, 1998, 1999, 2004 and 2009 general elections.

In the Rao government formed in 1991, Mamata Banerjee was made the Union Minister of State for Human Resources Development, Youth Affairs and Sports, and Women and Child Development. As the sports minister, she announced that she would resign, and protested in a rally at the Brigade Parade Ground in Kolkata, against Government's indifference towards her proposal to improve sports in the country. She was discharged of her portfolios in 1993. In April 1996, she alleged that Congress was behaving as a stooge of the CPI-M in West Bengal. She claimed that she was the lone voice of reason and wanted a "clean Congress". At a private rally at Alipore in Kolkata, Mamata Banerjee wrapped a black shawl around her neck and threatened to make a noose with it. In July 1996, she squatted at the well of Lok Sabha to protest against the hike in petroleum price, though she was a part of the Government. In that very time she clasped the coller of Amar singh, MP of Samajwadi Party, in the well of the parliament. In February 1997, on the day of railway budget presentation in Lok Sabha, Mamata Banerjee threw her shawl at the railway minister Ram Vilas Paswan for ignoring West Bengal and announced her resignation. The speaker, P. A. Sangma, did not accept her resignation and asked her to apologize. Later she came back as Santosh Mohan Deb mediated.

Trinamool Congress

In 1997, Mamata Banerjee came out of the Congress Party in West Bengal and established the All India Trinamool Congress. It quickly became the primary opposition to the long-standing Communist government in the state. On 11 December 1998, she controversially held a Samajwadi Party MP, Daroga Prasad Saroj, by the collar and dragged him out of the well of the Lok Sabha to prevent him from protesting against the Women's Reservation bill.

In 1999, she joined the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government and was allocated the Railways Ministry. She introduced a new biweekly New Delhi-Sealdah Rajdhani Express train and four express trains connecting various parts of West Bengal, namely the Howrah-Purulia Rupasi Bangla Express, Sealdah-New Jalpaiguri Express, Shalimar-Bankura Arannyak Express and the Sealdah-Amritsar Superfast Express (weekly).

She also focused on developing tourism, enabling the Darjeeling-Himalayan section with two additional locomotives and proposing the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation Limited. She also commented that India should play a pivotal role in the Trans-Asian Railway and that rail links between Bangladesh and Nepal would be reintroduced. In all, she introduced 19 new trains for the 2000–2001 fiscal year.

Mamata Banerjee suffered further setbacks in 2005, when her party lost control of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation and the sitting Mayor defected from her party. In 2006, the Trinamool Congress was defeated in West Bengal's Assembly Elections, losing more than half of its sitting members.

On 4 August 2006, she hurled her resignation paper at the deputy speaker Charanjit Singh Atwal in Lok Sabha. The provocation was the speaker's (Somnath Catterjee) rejection of her adjournment motion on illegal infiltration by Bangladeshi's in West Bengal. The motion was turned down by the speaker on the ground that it was not in proper format.

In November 2006, Mamata Banerjee was forcibly stopped on her way to Singur for a rally against a proposed Tata Motors car project. Mamata reached the West Bengal assembly and protested at the venue. She addressed a press conference at the assembly and announced a 12-hour shutdown by her party on Friday. The Trinamul Congress MLAs protested by damaging furniture and microphones in the West Bengal Assembly. A major strike was called on 14 December 2006.

Now in parliament election 2009 where TMC was with alliance with UPA and people of WestBengal acted against the Left front and elected Congress-TMC alliance cccin 26 seats, which made Mamata Banerjee again the Indian Railway Minister for next 5 years.

In the 2010 Municipal Elections in West Bengal, TMC won Kolkata Municipal Corporation in a margin of 62 seats. TMC Also won Bidhan Nagar Corporation in 16-9 seats margin. In 2011, she won a sweeping majority and is going to assume the position of chief minister of the state of West Bengal. Her party ended the 34 year rule of CPM.

Nandigram protests

The Nandigram violence was an incident in Nandigram, West Bengal where, on the orders of the Left Front government, more than 4,000 heavily armed police stormed the Nandigram area with the aim of stamping out protests against the West Bengal government’s plans to expropriate of land for a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) to be developed by the Indonesian-based Salim Group. The police shot dead at least 14 villagers and wounded 70 more.

The SEZ controversy started when the government of West Bengal decided that the Salim Group of Indonesia would set up a chemical hub under the SEZ policy at Nandigram, a rural area in the district of Purba Medinipur. The villagers took over the administration of the area and all the roads to the villages were cut off. A front-page story in the Kolkata newspaper, The Telegraph, on 4 January 2007 was headlined, "False alarm sparks clash". According to the newspaper that village council meeting at which the alleged land seizure was to be announced was actually a meeting to declare Nandigram a "clean village", that is, a village in which all the households had access to toilet facilities. The administration was directed to break the Maoist backed Bhumi Uchhed Pratirodh Committee's (BUPC) resistance at Nandigram and a massive operation with at least 3,000 policemen along with armed cadre of the Marxist ruling party was launched on 14 March 2007. However, prior information of the impending action had leaked out to the BUPC who amassed a crowd of roughly 2,000 villagers at the entry points into Nandigram with women and children forming the front ranks. In the resulting mayhem, at least 14 people were killed. Many common people were homeless due to this political carnage. A large number of Intellectuals protested on the streets and this incident gave birth of a new hope for movement to ouster the left from government headed by the CPI(M). Mamata Banerjee wrote letters to the Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil to stop the violence promoted by CPI(M) in Nandigram.Agitation in Nandigram has subsided, after the State Govt. shelved the proposed chemical hub project.

2009 Indian election

Trinamool congress performed well in the 2009 parliamentary election, bagging 19 MP seats, among them 5 women (including her), reiterating her faith in the Women's Reservation Bill. It’s allies Congress and SUCI also got 6 and 1 MP seats respectively. This is the best performance by any opposition party in West Bengal since the start of the left regime. Till date, the Congress victory of 16 seats in 1984, by the sympathy vote after the death of Mrs. Indira Gandhi, was considered the best opposition show.

Railway Minister, second tenure

In 2009, Mamata Banerjee became Railway Minister for the second time. Thereafter, she announced a number of new initiatives in the Railway Budget 2009. Some argued that these reflected her bias towards her home state (West Bengal, though she did still lead initiatives to benefit the entire country. She decided to develop about 50 stations as world class stations with international level facilities. These will be developed through innovative financing and in Public Private Partnership mode. She also declared the Railway Ministry's intention to develop another 375 stations as Adarsh (Ideal) Stations. Further, she announced construction of multi-functional complexes in station premises for providing rail users facilities like shopping, food stalls and restaurants, book stalls, PCO/STD/ISD/Fax booths, medicine & variety stores, budget hotels, underground parking etc. She announced that these complexes will also be developed by Public-Private Partnerships. She also decided to set up scholarships for the higher education of the female children of group D staff, to promote their economic independence. She proposed to open seven Nursing Colleges on Railway land. She also introduced some new train services like “Duronto”, “Yuva” in the budget. Now “Duronto” is the fastest train service in India. To relieve women passengers during rush hour, Mamata started Ladies Special Train on 19 July between Bandel and Howrah. Later, some more Ladies Special Trains have been introduced by her, e.g. Kalyani-Sealdah, Panvel-Mumbai CST.

Mamata Banerjee flagged off the Duronto Express – a non-stop train, fastest train of India between Sealdah and New Delhi on 18 September. Super fast Duronto Express train between Chennai and New Delhi was introduced on 21 September. She also took steps to spread railway in terror hit regions of Kashmir. Anantnag-Qadigund Railway line was inaugurated in October.

On 7 February 2010, Banerjee will start as many as nineteen new train services. Due to repeated sexual harassment and/or sexual assault of India's women commuters, eight trains will be designated as women-only.

2011 Assembly election

Mamata Banerjee's All India Trinamool Congress along with SUCI & Indian National Congress Alliance won the state assembly election against Left Ruling party by securing 227 seats. Trinamool Congress alone won 184 seats with the INC winning 42 seats where the other ally SUCI secured 1 seat. Throughout the 34 year regime, the LF has never won fewer than two-thirds of the 294 seats, but this time they could only manage 62 seats.

Chief Minister

She was sworn in as Chief Minister of West Bengal on 20 May 2011. She is the first woman Chief Minister of West Bengal. As a chief minister one of her first decisions was to return 400 acres of land to Singur farmers. "The cabinet has decided to return 400 acres to unwilling farmers in Singur," the chief minister said. "I have instructed the department to prepare the papers for this. If Tatababu wants, he can set up his factory on the remaining 600 acres, otherwise we will see how to go about it," she added.

References

External links

Official biographical sketch in Parliament of India website

Official Party website

Profile: by BBC News dated 13 May 2011

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