After threatening to whip her security staff, chief minister of West Bengal Mamata Banerjee now wants to slap journalists. “I will give you one tight slap, you uncivilised creatures,” she said on Sunday at a fair in Burdwan, 150km from Kolkata. The cause of her rage: In the rush to photograph her, a photojournalist had stumbled and fallen close to a spot where some women were cooking.

Only last week, the CM was at the Kolkata Book Fair when she suddenly decided to leave the fair grounds. Given the crowd, it took a while for the car to reach the spot where she was waiting, and security personnel had to bear the brunt of the delay. “Apnader chabkano uchit (You deserve to be whipped),” Banerjee yelled at special branch officer KK Dwivedi.  

Trinamool leaders refused to comment on Sunday’s episode when contacted by HT.

State Congress chief Pradip Bhattacharya said, “If the chief minister herself behaves this way, how do we expect other party members to conduct themselves?”

Of late, Banerjee has been attracting increasing criticism for her aggressive stance on various issues. On January 21, while addressing a public rally in South 24 Parganas, she said, “I went 10 times to the Prime Minister asking for fiscal relief but to no avail. What else can I do? Should I beat him up?”