The reason is obvious. The CM had told media early on in the case that the whole rape was “concocted” to “malign” her government and that the details would be revealed soon.

The details were revealed and the Chief Minister has been caught on very much the wrong foot. The story was not fabricated. The woman had not lied. She had been lied to by the men who befriended her at the nightclub and gave her fake names. But the assault had happened.

Now the spotlight has shifted to the CM herself. Why had she felt compelled to speak out on a case that was under investigation? Why had she not stopped her cabinet ministers from going on television shows to blame the victim for being out on her own that late at a nightclub?

Even her Trinamool colleagues are red-faced though none will go on the record. “This episode has not gone down well with the people and has hurt her image,” an unnamed Trinamool leader told The Telegraph.

Mamata, as an opposition leader, had built up her political reputation as the champion of the victim. In the process she sees herself as the permanent victim. As CM she is becoming a victim of her own paranoia, convinced that everything that happens in the state is somehow about her, and that everyone from her allies in the Congress to her opponents in the Left Front are out to get her.

“At a broader level Mamata has, since taking charge, harped unfailingly on the conspiracy refrain to tackle any dispute, be it sharing Teesta waters with Bangladesh or setting up a Lokayukta,” editorialises the Times of India.

Mamata, of all people, should have understood the vulnerability of a single woman out on her own, who seems to flout the middle class mores of Bengali society. The CPI-M leaders had gleefully made digs at her gender and singleness when she was an opposition leader. She has been compared to a “prostitute” and  disparaged as a “Kalighater mynah” (Kalighat is her family home, mynah is an overly talkative bird). A top Communist leader even snidely asked the media “Onar eto bukey laagey keno bolun to (Why does she keep getting hurt on the chest so much?)” after Mamata complained about being beaten up in clashes with police at Singur. “The CPI-M leveraged gender as a weapon to trivialise, even vulgarise, their rhetoric of attack on the Trinamool Congress president, her status as a single woman without the bulwark of exotic lineage or formidable rank of wealth and class shielding her,” writes Monobina Gupta in Didi, her political biography of Mamata.

Mamata once lambasted the CPI-M for using rape as a political weapon. The Singur agitation caught fire after the murder of a 16-year old woman. Mamata had fought tooth and nail for a CBI inquiry after the CPI-M was accused of launching a smear campaign accusing the young woman’s father of raping her. Now Mamata finds herself accused of inserting politics into a rape case. As a woman heading the government, she does not have to be a feminist. She does not even have to show any special sensitivity to women’s issues. But there is no need to re-victimise the victim.

Mamata’s silence is uncharacteristic for the blunt plain-spoken politician that she is. She might well have made an honest mistake in this case. But to get out of this mess that she herself created, she must do something even more uncharacteristic. The state is watching.

Along with a new logo, the kolkata based team also launced a new marketing campaign ‘New Dawn New Knights’. Speaking about the changes in the logo and design team owner Shah Rukh said Khan said, “The golden color was because I like gold and the black has been changed because I was told that it was not lucky. And last year since we couldn’t make it to the last four I can’t even argue with it.”

Apparently, the session which lasted for about fifty minutes and had a five minutes presser, was blacked out by the organisers as the press conference was showing no signs of ending.

The West Bengal Chief Minister Ms. Mamata Banerjee and noted Italian writer and journalist Beppe Severnyni jointly inaugurated the Book Fair.

Residents of nearby apartments rushed out of their homes with portable fire extinguishers to help firemen who were trying to hose down the flames. Hundreds vacated their houses in terror as the fire leapt 20 feet in the air and kept advancing towards an underground reservoir of thousands of litres of fuel. The shopping destinations of Vardaan Market and 22 Camac Street are within a stone’s throw of the petrol pump, which is surrounded by residential and office buildings.

the slogan Why this herogiri di? across the streets in the city, asking bike riders to wear helmets and ride safely.

“During the year-end, bikers while enjoying themselves often do not wear helmets and ride rashly. So we came up with this catchy line to attract the attention of errant riders,” police commissioner R.K. Pachnanda said. “We want them to be happy but at the same time they must follow the safety rules,” he added.

The sign boards show two riders on a bike without helmets. Above them is written Why this herogiri, herogiri, herogiri di? and below is the request to wear helmets. The hoardings have been put up strategically across important and busy crossings and streets in the city.

Dhanush and composer of the song, Aniruddh, performed the phenomenal song in Kolkata on Christmas day amid thousands of screaming and cheering fans.

The fire was detected at the factory housed in a three-storied building at about11 pm on Monday. Twenty fire tenders were pressed into service to douse the flames. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee reached to the spot at 12.30 am on Tuesday and oversaw fire-fighting operations for nearly an hour.

Although there was no report of any causality, there was panic in the area and the nearby slums were vacated.

During a surprise check by fire and emergency services wing of the Chandigarh municipal corporation on Monday, authorities came across three city hospitals a -Mukut Hospital and Inscol Hospital in Sector 34 and Government Multi-speciality Hospital, Sector 16- functioning without proper fire safety equipment.

Telecom and information technology minister Kapil Sibal’s suggestion for pre-screening of content in online forums may have sparked controversy today, but when it comes to post-screening, law enforcement agencies in India have been very active. They regularly approach internet service providers to remove anything they deem “offensive” to politicians.

The main fight is between CPI-M’s Ritabrata Banerjee and Trinamool Congress’s Subrata Bakshi. Besides, there are three independent candidates. Polling will be from 8am to 5pm. Total no. of electors are 1383639. Counting of votes will be on Dec.4.