Adhir Ranjan apologies to Derek O’Brien for calling him ‘foreigner’
New Delhi: Senior Congress leader and the Leader of Congress parliamentary party in Lok Sabha, Adhir Ranjan Chowdury, on Friday tendered an apology to Trinamool Congress leader Derek O’Brien for calling him a “foreigner”.
“I conveyed my regrets to MR DEREK O’BRIEN for an word inadvertently uttered by me on him as FOREIGNER,” Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said in a post on X (formerly known as Twitter).
On Thursday, Adhir Ranjan, while speaking to reporters in Siliguri had said, “Derek O’Brien is a foreigner, he knows a lot of things. Ask him”.
The Congress leader’s remarks came after Derek O’Brien accused Adhir Ranjan of being the reason why the seat-sharing talks fell in West Bengal with the INDIA bloc. The Trinamool leader also alleged that Adhir Ranjan was working at the behest of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
“Three reasons for the alliance not working in Bengal – Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury and Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury,” O’Brien told reporters in Delhi.
Furthermore, O’Brien asserted that though the INDIA bloc has many detractors, but only two – the BJP and Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury had spoken against the bloc.
“The voice is his, but the words are being dictated to him by the duo in Delhi. In the past two years, Adhir Chowdhury has spoken the language of the BJP. Not once has he raised the issue of Bengal being deprived of central funds,” he said.
Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury has criticised Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress after the party announced to ditch the INDIA alliance and go solo in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.