The BJP on Wednesday put its best foot forward to downplay the eighth edition of the Bengal Global Business Summit (BGBS) and asked chief minister Mamata Banerjee to present a white paper on the outcomes of her industrialisation initiatives and threatened to come up with a “black paper” if she failed to accept the challenge.

“Would Hon’ble Chief Minister dare to inform the people of West Bengal, how much of the PROPOSED Investment of ₹3.76 lakh crore, announced in BGBS 2023, have been invested till now?,” leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari wrote on his official social media handle before Mamata delivered her opening speech at the BGBS.

The BGBS at New Town on Wednesday. Picture by Biswarup Dutta

“On behalf of the people of West Bengal let me ask Hon’ble CM, what is the status of Deocha Pachami, where you announced the creation of 2 lakh jobs? And what is the current status of Tajpur Port for which the Agreement was signed with much fanfare?”

However, within three hours of Adhikari’s post, the chief minister announced that the infrastructure was ready and coal excavation at Deocha-Pachami could begin as early as Thursday. A senior official said the first phase of the work — basalt mining on 326 acres of land in the proposed coalmine in Birbhum — would begin on Thursday as Mamata had announced.

“BGBS is not Bengal Global Business Summit. It’s a 2 day Optical illusion event, consciously wrapped up in glossy paper to hide the industrialization drought of WB,” the Nandigram MLA added in his post.

Apart from Adhikari, the BJP’s IT chief and Bengal co-minder Amit Malviya, and the party’s state president Sukanta Majumdar and general secretary Jagannath Chattopadhyay underlined how Bengal was lagging in industrialisation compared to other states. They claimed that organising the “glossy” BGBS was a “farce”.

After taking oath as the chief minister for the third consecutive term in 2021, Mamata vowed that her administratyion would concentrate on industrialisation and employment generation.

“Since the first Bengal Global Business Summit in 2015, 21,521 industrial units shut down between 2016and 2021, according to areport by the West Bengal Environment Department. This mass closure has displaced lakhs of workers,” Malviya wrote on X, soon after Mamata hailed the state as a hub ofindustries with the participation of at least 200 foreigndelegates in the eith edition of the BGBS.

“Continuing her tradition of deceiving the public, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has once again orchestrated an elaborate farce—the Bengal Global Business Summit—to mislead the people of Bengal,” Malviya added.

Chattopadhyay, who conducted a one-hour-long news conference to highlight how the Mamata government allegedly failed in industrialisation despite her multiple sky-high announcements and foreign trips, demanded that the chief minister come up with a white paper.

“We demand that she (Mamata) immediately issue a white paper on proposed industries, industries which have come up in the state, the status of available land for industrialisation, foreign investments and the cost of bringing industries to Bengal. If she does not do so, we will come up with a ‘black paper’ on the state’s industrial status very soon,” Chattopadhyay said.

The CPM also raised similar questions, saying although pictures of the chief minister flooded every edition of the BGBS, she couldn’t be featured in a single photograph while inaugurating a new industry in the state.

“Till last year’s event, the chief minister had proposed investments worth around ₹20 lakh crore. But in reality, not even ₹20,000 crore was invested in the state. You can see her attending such luxurious events in pictures, but you can’t find her in a single photograph inaugurating a new industry in the state,” CPM leader Sujan Chakraborty said.

Mamata, however, claimed on Wednesday that out of investment proposals worth over ₹19 lakh crore received in the last seven editions of the BGBS, those of more than ₹12 lakh crore had been implemented and the remaining were in various stages of execution.

Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren and industrialist Mukesh Ambani were among the present dignitaries present at the BGBS on Wednesday.