Calcutta, Jan. 14: One Mamata today apologised for using the name of another Mamata.

Mamata Roy, president of the West Bengal Board of Secondary Education, said sorry for “inadvertently using” the name of Trinamul Congress chief Mamata Banerjee in a manual to create awareness among teachers against corporal punishment.

A play in the 42-page handbook tries to show how teachers develop stress because of social issues — like Tata Motors being forced to pull out of Singur — and tend to vent the anger on children in class- rooms.

It begins with a conversation between a teacher named Samirbabu and his wife Sun- anda. He reads a newspaper and is in a hurry because he has to take an auto, then the Metro and an auto again to reach school. He discusses the day’s news with Sunanda that include the Tatas pulling out, Sourav Ganguly being drop- ped, India’s defeat to Australia in cricket and the govern- ment’s delay in implementing the Sixth Pay Commission’s recommendations.

Samirbabu tells his wife: “Look, the Tatas have said they will leave Singur. Nothing good will happen to this state. After so many years, an industrialist had shown interest in investing here, but Mamata has driven him (Ratan Tata) away.”

Without naming Mamata Banerjee, the Madhyamik board chief said: “Under no circumstance, the name of a well- known political leader should have been used. We are extremely sorry and we offer sincere apology.”

“The first draft module had a dialogue between two characters. In one sentence, the name of an eminent, respected and popular leader inadvertently and unintentionally came in. The moment this error came to our notice, it was rectified and the corrected module was redistributed,” Roy added.

She said teachers who had prepared the manual put the leader’s name by mistake. “But we should not have made this kind of mistake. We will make sure such mistakes are never made in the future.”

The board has withdrawn the draft from schools. Headmasters had been given copies of the manual during a workshop held between January 9 and 11.

Roy said the board had only wanted to tell teachers through the one-act play that they should keep their minds off such controversial issues before leaving for school.