Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, June 2: A Maharashtra-type political development seems to be unfolding in West Bengal with one of the Trinamool Congress suspended leader claiming to have formed a separate group with the support of near two-third members of the TMC Legislature party asserting itself to be “Real Trinamool.”
Amid politics heating up in West Bengal, former party spokesman Riju Dutta, who was removed from the party for alleged anti-party activities post the defeat in the Assembly elections, on Tuesday claimed that 50 of the 80-member TMC legislature party are united and had met at a hotel recently. His remarks added fresh suspense to the future of TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee and her party weeks after suffering a big defeat at the hands of the BJP.
Giving details about the ongoing “signature scandal” that has triggered a CID investigation, Dutta, spoke about two expelled Trinamool MLAs, Ritabrata Banerjee and Sandipan Saha, who claimed their signatures were forged in documents submitted to the West Bengal Assembly. He also said some party leaders would approach the Speaker of the Assembly this afternoon to raise their issues.
Mr Ritabrata Banerjee, however, denied of having made any such move under his leadership to split the party and threatened to file a defamation suit against Riju Dutta. Describing Mr Dutta’s claim “completely baseless,” Mr Banerjee denied having any involvement or knowledge of floating a separate legislative outfit and said the narrative designing him as the face of mutiny within the party was aimed at tarnishing his image as a disciplined soldier of a party.
Riju Dutta had earlier said a “Maharashtra model” was in place in Bengal as he claimed that about 50 MLAs are united to form a two-thirds majority. “We are a two-thirds majority. Around 50 MLAs are with us. Since we are the real Trinamool Congress, the Leader of the Opposition will be Ritabrata Banerjee and not Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay,” Dutta said, adding that since the majority was formed by the said legislators, they should also be allowed to retain the party symbol.
He went on to say that the “Shiv Sena Maharashtra model” was currently in place in Bengal. Mr Dutta apparently was referring to the 2022 split of Shiv Sena into two factions, after which the then Uddhav Thackeray-led Maha Vikas Aghadi government was ousted from power in that state. A fight for the party’s name and symbol had erupted then as well and the decision went in favour of the Shinde faction because he had the majority of the elected MLAs with him.
However, Mamata Banerjee is wiser by the Maharashtra experience and is learnt to be arming herself to such a disaster for the party that she founded and nurtured for over two decades.
Riju Dutta’s remarks aren’t first indication of a very public rift within the Trinamool Congress. On Monday, the party had expelled two of its MLAs, Ritabrata Banerjee and Sandipan Saha after 61 out of 80 party MLAs skipped key meetings convened by Ms Banerjee.
However, the timing of these expulsions raised eyebrows, as they came almost immediately after the legislators publicly questioned the “forged” signatures. The scandal pertains to documents submitted to the West Bengal Assembly regarding the appointment of the Leader of the Opposition and the party’s chief whip after the 2026 elections which the TMC lost for which a CID robe has been lodged.
