The discussion on the Railway Budget in Lok Sabha on Tuesday had MPs taking swipes at each other, forcing railway minister Mamata Banerjee to join issue, at times snapping in anger, at times in bemusement, with Opposition MPs.

Ananth Kumar, BJP leader and MP from Bangalore (South) who initiated the debate, accused Banerjee of reducing the Railways to a modern-day variant of the East India Company, implying that most developmental measures finding mention in the minister’s Budget,”were meant for West Bengal and east Indian states".

“You should have a pan-Indian outlook, but your Budget reads like an election manifesto... Of the 309 model stations proposed in your Budget, 40 are in and around Kolkata, and 109 in West Bengal," Kumar said.

When Banerjee replied”it was for MPs to suggest names of more stations which will be duly incorporated in the proposed scheme", Kumar said the Railways should be conducting this exercise. He accused her of”having a West Bengal bias".

Visibly upset, Banerjee told him:”Don’t insult Bengal." He retorted:”Don’t insult Bangalore," suggesting that the Karnataka capital had not been accorded its due place in the Railway Budget.

Ananth Kumar then said he”loved Rabindranath Tagore and Vande Mataram more than Mamata." To this, Banerjee said:”I love Bengal, I love Bangalore, and this entire exercise is for a larger entity called India".

Continuing with the discussion, Congress MP from Nagpur, Vilas Muttemwar, while praising the Budget, inadvertently referred to Mumbai as “Bombay", prompting BJP MP Gopinath Munde to demand an immediate correction.

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