Kolkata, May 11: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee trained guns against the Centre during the video-conference chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi with all the State CMs on Monday. Marking her dissent against the deployment of central team in Bengal to assess COVID-19 response, Mamata said that attempts were made to derive "political mileage" amid the pandemic. 'India's Success in Handling COVID-19 Globally Recognised', Says PM Narendra Modi in Video-Conference With State CMs.

"We are together in this crisis, however, somehow West Bengal has been targeted by central government to get political mileage," Mamata said at the video-conference, shortly before PM Modi pitched for unity among all states and union territories to curb the transmission of coronavirus.

"Besides central government instructions and advisories, central teams have been deputed for supervision and monitoring, which had taken away much of the time of senior officers from focusing on fight against coronavirus," she added.

The West Bengal government, headed by Mamata's Trinamool Congress (TMC), drew flak from the Centre-ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for allegedly conducting insufficient number of tests in the state. The Modi government had tasked an Inter Ministerial Central Team (ICMT) to ascertain whether the state's response to coronavirus crisis is adequate.

The IMCT, in its report submitted to the Home Ministry last week, was critical of Mamata Banerjee government's handling of COVID-19 in the state. The panel suspected discrepancies in the number of coronavirus cases reported in the state, and also red-flagged the mortality rate of 12.8 percent -- which was higher than the national average of 3.3 percent.

West Bengal has so far reported a total of 1,939 coronavirus cases, with 124 new infections being recorded today. The death count in the state is 185, whereas, 415 patients have been discharged. Nationwide, the toll of cases accelerated to 67,152 and the fatalities surged to 2,206.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on May 11, 2020 09:14 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).