The West Bengal assembly on 7 September passed a resolution by majority vote to make Poila Baisakh (Bengali New Year) on April 15 as Bengal Day, reported news agency PTI.
She even added that the day will be observed regardless of the approval of the state's governor with whom the CM Banerjee has been engaged in a war of words.
The resolution was passed with 167 members, in a House of 294, who voted in favour of it. While, 62 MLAs from the BJP, which wants to observe 20 June, the day the Bengal assembly voted in favour of partition, as the state day, voted against it while the lone ISF MLA abstained.
As per details, a resolution under Rule 169 was tabled in the assembly, proposing to observe Poila Baisakh, as "Bangla Diwas" and Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore's 'Banglar Mat, Banglar Jol' (Bengal's soil, Bengal's Water) as the state song.
"I support the proposal of making Rabindranath Tagore's 'Banglar Mati Banglar Jol' the official song of Bengal. People of Bengal don't support June 20, which is synonymous with violence and bloodshed which marked partition as the state foundation day," Banerjee said while speaking on the resolution.
Earlier last week, Banerjee said the Centre's choice of 20 June as the state's foundation day is "wrong," and the day for observing the occasion will be decided in the assembly.
It is to be known that on 20 June, 1947, MLAs from West Bengal voted for partition, after a joint meeting with MLAs from East Bengal (which became East Pakistan) voted against partition of the state.
Reacting on Suvendu Adhikari's comment that the resolution will not receive the Governor CV Ananda Bose's assent, the feisty TMC boss said, "If the governor doesn't give his nod to this resolution of observing state day on Poila Baisakh, we will still observe it."
With agency inputs.
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