Mamata Banerjee rides electric scooter to protest fuel price hike

A helmet-clad Banerjee waved at people on both sides of the road during the seven-km-long journey from Hazra More to the state secretariat.

After reaching Nabanna following a 45-minute ride, Banerjee slammed the BJP-led Government at the Centre saying, "We are protesting against the fuel price hike. The Modi government only makes false promises."

"The BJP had promised free LPG connections to the people before coming to power and now they are hiking its price," Banerjee said.

"Modi and Shah are selling the country. They are selling the profit-making PSUs. This is an anti-people, anti-woman, anti-youth, anti-farmer government," she said.

She also criticized the BJP government for renaming Ahmedabad's Sardar Patel Stadium after Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

"A middle-class household needs two LPG cylinders a month which they can't afford now. Over one crore people in our state also depend on kerosene which they are not getting now," she said.

Banerjee said she will return home in the evening on the e-scooter.

Banerjee was trailed by security personnel on other two-wheelers as other vehicles followed her a little distance away.

There was tight security along the Hazra-Exide-AJC Bose Road-Vidyasagar Setu route.

The Opposition parties, however, called her protest an "election stunt."

"The CM is resorting to novel theatrics ahead of the elections but the state government is not doing its bit to reduce fuel prices," BJP leader Jai Prakash Majumdar said.

Congress Legislature Party leader Abdul Mannan said, "This is nothing but an election stunt. Why is the state government not substantially withdrawing cess to blunt the fuel price hike effect to help the common man?"

Left Front leader Sujan Chakraborty compared her fuel hike protest with her earlier riding pillion on a motorcycle ridden by former PCAPA leader Chhatradhar Mahato during the Lalgarh agitation.