Kolkata, Oct 31 (IANS) West Bengal Transport Minister and senior Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) leader Subhash Chakraborty Friday criticised opposition leader Mamata Banerjee’s movement against land acquisition in Singur, and claimed the people have no interest in her agitation.”Banerjee’s movement will not get any momentum in the state. Now people are not interested in her anti-land acquisition stand. People have realised the need for the industrial drive in West Bengal,” Chakraborty said.

Last week, Banerjee declared she would launch a fresh agitation and hold public meeting Nov 2 at Singur and demanded the owners be returned the land “forcibly acquired” by the government for the aborted Tata Motors’ Nano project in Singur.

With the Trinamool-led opposition launching a sustained and intense agitation on the land issue, Tata Motors earlier this month shifted its Nano factory to Sanand, near Ahmedabad, in Gujarat.

The minister, who had asserted a few days back that the state government would ink a fresh pact by Friday with another industrialist for setting up an automobile plant on the plot in Singur where the Nano project was earlier slated to come up, clarified that the deal could not go through as the land was still in the possession of the Tatas.

“There are legal complexities involved on the land issue. No alternative industry can be set up till the Tatas don’t hand over the land to the state government,” he said.