Mamata Banerjee to skip One Nation One Election meeting, cancels her Delhi visit at the last minute

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is to skip the meeting on the One Nation One Election in New Delhi on Tuesday citing the impending state budget on February 8 and “other issues of priority”. She was slated to travel to the national capital on Monday and as announced previously by herself, she would attend the meeting to give her feedback to the experts panel committee examining the possibility of One Nation One Election, chaired by former President of India Ram Nath Kovind. Trinamool Congress will however attend the meeting, MP Kalyan Banerjee and Sudip Bandyopadhyay will be representing the party, announced the TMC supremo on Monday.

“State budget is there on February 8. Lot of work in hand and it is difficult for me to stay out of the state now. Thus I have decided not to visit Delhi now. Kalyan Banerjee and Sudip Bandyopadhyay will give the feedback, the party position on one nation one election”, said the Chief Minister in a hurriedly called press conference on Monday.

TMC supremo had previously written a letter last month to the experts committee expressing strong reservations on the proposal of one nation one election, calling it against the principles of India's constitutional arrangements. “Non-simultaneous federal and state elections are a basic feature in the Westminster system which should not be altered…non-simultaneity is part of the basic structure of the Indian Constitutional arrangements”, TMC Supremo Mamata Banerjee had written in her letter to the Committee last month.​