'Military coup', claims Mamata; just routine exercises, say Army officials

New Delhi: Indian Army officials on Friday said there was nothing unusual about the deployment of its forces at toll plazas in West Bengal on Thursday night, a step that has raised the hackles of the state’s Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.

"There is nothing alarming about this and it is carried out as per government orders," Wing Commander S S Birdi said.

The exercise gives an estimate about the number of vehicles passing through a certain area that could be tapped during operations, he said.

The Army had said they were conducting routine exercise with full knowledge and coordination with West Bengal Police. Such exercises had been conducted earlier in North Eastern states too, an army spokesman said.

On Mamata Banerjee’s charge that the army collected money from people at toll nakas in West Bengal, Major General Sunil Yadav called the charges ‘baseless.’

"Army formations in Eastern command at local levels are carrying out routine annual data collection exercises in coordination with local police authorities. Exercise involves collection of data in all North Eastern states, including Assam, Arunachal, West Bengal, Manipur, Nagaland, Meghalaya, Tripura, Mizoram and Sikkim," he added.

"Over 80 such collection data points have been established in the entire region. 5-6 Army personnel have been posted at each point and they are unarmed. They're only collecting data of heavy vehicles. This is an annual exercise carried out every year," Yadav concluded.

Banerjee continued to stay put at the state secretariat on Friday protesting against army presence at toll plazas in several parts of the state and asked whether it was an "army coup".

Army personnel, however, had left the toll plaza near the secretariat last night.

Speaking to reporters late last night at 'Nabanna', the state secretariat, she said, "I will stay at the secretariat to guard our democracy".

"Is this a military coup," she asked.

She said that army personnel were there in different districts like Murshidabad, Jalpaiguri, Darjeeling, North 24 Paragans, Burdwan, Howrah, Hooghly etc.

"The army is deployed without informing the state government. This is unprecedented and a very serious matter", she had said.

The TMC leadership has decided to raise the issue in both the houses of Parliament and also inform President Pranab Mukherjee about the incident.

"We are talking to all political parties. We are planning to raise the issue in Parliament today. Lets see," TMC national spokesperson Derek O' Brien told PTI.

A senior TMC leader on condition of anonymity said, "We are planning to meet President Pranab Mukherjee and inform him about the incident. The entire country should know, how BJP is engaged in vindictive politics,".

The senior TMC leader said they have spoken to Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad and discussed how to counter this issue jointly.

Senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel had called up Banerjee in the morning and inquired about the incident.

A defence spokesperson had said that the army conducts bi-annual exercise throughout the country with an aim of getting statistical data about the load carriers that could be made available to the army in case of a contingency.