New Delhi : In response to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s allegations regarding a muted mic at the NITI Aayog meeting and the boycott by Opposition, Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde said that the opposition is more interested in politics than development and wants to defame India in foreign countries.

Speaking with the reporters, Shinde said, “They do not want development, they do not want the country to progress. They just want to do politics and defame the country’s name in foreign countries.”

Shinde further stated that the opposition came together with the goal of defeating Prime Minister Modi in the Lok Sabha elections. “The opposition united to defeat PM Modi in the Lok Sabha but the people of the country supported him and made him the Prime Minister again.

And that is why, he will do more work in the coming five years than he has done they have done in the last 10 years,” he added.

After crashing out of the Niti Aayog meeting chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi midway, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee accused the Centre of “insulting Bengal” by interrupting her speech after five minutes, adding that it was a deliberate attempt to “malign the Opposition”.

Accusing the Centre of favouring BJP-ruled states by providing them privileges and packages, Mamata Banerjee said, “I said whatever I could in the 3 to 4 minutes that I got. In the entire country, the way in which all the opposition-ruled states have been neglected and BJP ruled states and their alliance members have been favoured, we don’t have any objection if any state is given more money but this is not acceptable that someone will get and someone will not get at all.”

The Chief Minister defended her decision of boycotting the meeting and said that she should have been given extra time as she was representing the entire opposition.

Mamata Banerjee said, “I was the only one from the Opposition ruled states who had gone there. They should have given me 30 minutes…At the beginning of the meeting, Rajnath Singh said that everyone should present their views in 5-7 minutes but I was not even given 7 minutes to speak.

Their people were given 20 minutes, they got special packages and privileges but others got 0 minutes. I did the right thing by boycotting the meeting. I will not let them insult Bengal. I stand strongly with the Opposition parties running the government in other states.”

She further said that she hit out at the central government and said that the Centre only gives directives and paste posters, but the work has to be done by the states.