The Centre granted a package of `21,614 crores to the cash-strapped West Bengal government on Saturday to help it tide over its financial crisis prompting CM Mamata Banerjee to express her gratitude to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for his “intervention” in helping her government. The
development came after a series of meetings between state finance minister Amit Mitra and Union finance minister Pranab Mukherjee in Delhi on the bailout package from the finance ministry to the state government.
“We received a fax saying the Centre has given us `21,614 crores. It is not a package. I convey my thanks to the PM for his intervention and the finance minister,” she said at Writers’ Buildings. Expressing her dissatisfaction, she said most of the package was state’s share. “Only `9,240 crores have been sanctioned as granting aid for the development programmes in the state.”