Mamata Banerjee shows Congress, CPM who's the boss

Kolkata: High on the victory wave, Trinamool supporters broke into a delirious dance outside Mamata Banerjee's Kalighat home on Thursday. But inside, the party chief's expression did not betray the delirium taking over the state. A rather sombre Mamata declared her accountability was to the people of Bengal only, that she was happy they had approved of her development path.
"People are asking me why I am not smiling. I am telling them people's smile is my smile. I prefer seeing everything through the people," she said.
As her 56-day campaign ended in the dramatic win, Mamata said the verdict swept away all the canard against her party. "People go by the work that a government does. They have seen our achievements in the past four-and-a-half years. Swapna ektai, Bangla ke biswashera kora. Rajniti ta je nongra parjya chole gechhilo seta bhalo noy... jara amay galagali diechhen ami tadero abhinandan janacchi... tadero dirghayu kamona korchi (My dream is to make Bengal the best in the world. The dirty level that politics had reached is not good. But I still congratulate those who have been abusing me. I pray for their long lives)," she said. She even uncharacteristically downplayed her Delhi aspirations: "I am too small. For now, let me work in West Bengal." But Mamata did not forget to mention her favourite "federal front". "The country has to have a federal front. I favour federal front... the Congress can join there... but with the CPM, I can't work with the Congress. There are friends such as Chandrababu Naidu, Arvind Kejriwal, Naveen Patnaik, Nitish Kumar, Lalu Yadav and Jayalalithaa, we will sit and talk," she said.
On Narendra Modi and Sonia Gandhi-both had attacked her in the past few months- she said, "Modiji's phone call was customary. The BJP divides people. Don't force me (to) talk about her (Sonia)... Narendra Modi ka sabse bada USP toh Rahul Gandhi hai (Rahul is the biggest strength of Modi)."
But Mamata had a word of caution: "An elected government was not allowed to function. We were up against a lot... I have been in politics for the past 40 years. I would like to thank the EC, though there have been excesses. Ambulances were stopped, a sweet shop owner was assaulted... Families were terrorized in Bhowanipore. At Jadavpur, 90% polling was done with help from certain quarters. Kintu jara kaj korbe manush tader grahan korbe (but people will accept only those who work)."