Terming the death of Café Coffee Day founder VG Siddhartha as “very unfortunate”, chief minister Mamata Banerjee today said if all industrialists leave the country like this or commit suicide then it is a “dangerous signal for the country”. She said that the coffee baron was depressed due to “harassment and pressure from different agencies for which he could not run his business …..which he could not resist”.
Miss Banerjee expressed her deep condolence to the family members of Siddhartha. “I’m feeling sad today because it should not be the future of the industry or agriculture,” she said.
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Miss Banerjee slammed the Centre over the incident and wrote on her Facebook wall: “I hear from different sources that captains of industry in the country are under pressure; some of them have left the country and some are contemplating to move out. All the Opposition political parties are afraid of horse trading and harassment with political vendetta.”
She said that amidst the country’s poor economic growth, Centre is contemplating to disinvest government assets.
“The economic growth of the country has nosedived to as low as 5.8 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2018-19, the lowest in the last five years, and unemployment has increased to the highest level in the last 45 years…Central government is actively for pursuing for disinvestment of government assets from Ordnance Factory Board to BSNL, from Air India to Railways, from Chittaranjan Locomotive Works to Alloy Steel Plant, Durgapur and about 45 more public sector undertakings. The overall economy is in bad shape with the common people suffering the most,” she wrote.
“Industry and agriculture and creation of employment is the future of our country. If industry is demoralised, then there will be no economic and employment growth. As a result, more and more people will become jobless,” she added.
Miss Banerjee appealed to the Central government “to work in a peaceful manner so that people are confident and that political vendetta and agencies do not destroy the future of the country.”