Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, June 8: After the legislature party, the rebellion in the erstwhile ruling party in West Bengal the Trinamool Congress, has reached its Parliamentary wing with at least 20 of the party’s 29 members in the Lok Sabha have decided to form a separate block and extend their support to the BJP-led NDA government at the Centre while one of its members in the Rajya Sabha resigned from the party on Monday and also quit the Upper House.
The development came on a day when the party supremo Mamata Banerjee and her second-in command Abhishek Banerjee were also in Delhi attending a meeting of the opposition INDIA bloc. The rebel TMC MPs held a meeting at the residence of the union minister Bhupendra Yadav and decided to write a letter to the Lok Sabha speaker Om Birla informing him about their decision to form a separate bloc and extend support to the Narendra Modi government.
According to sources, the MPs involved in these developments include Prasun Banerjee (Howrah), Sharmila Sarkar (Bardhaman Purba), Arup Chakraborty (Bankura), Kalipada Soren (Jhargram), Jagadish Chandra Basunia (Cooch Behar), Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar (Barasat), Partha Bhowmick (Barrackpore), Bapi Halder (Mathurapur), Satabdi Roy (Birbhum), Asit Kumar Mal (Bolpur), June Malia (Medinipur), Abu Taher Khan (Murshidabad), and Khalilur Rahman (Jangipur). However, TMC insiders claim that it may be difficult for MPs from minority backgrounds to join any new political outfit, and suggest that at least some of them may eventually return to the party fold.
Sources present at the meeting said 20 Lok Sabha MPs of Trinamool Congress were present. Barasat Lok Sabha MP Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, who had earlier criticised the Trinamool leadership, is emerging as the leader of the bloc. Dr Dastidar, who was recently removed as Trinamool chief whip in the Lok Sabha, has started warming up to the BJP.
Earlier the TMC Rajya Sabha member Sukhendu Sekhar Roy resigned from both the party and the Rajya Sabha and later attended the rebels’ meeting. Mr Roy also levelled serious allegations against the TMC leadership including widespread corruption in the rank and file and spreading a reign of terror among the people in the state. The development in the Parliamentary party comes about a week after nearly 60 of the 80 MLAs of the Trinamool Congress, came out in open rebellion and elected a new Leader of Opposition Ritabrata Banerjee by-passing Ms Banerjee’s nominee of Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay. Mr Ritabrata also welcomed the fast-changing developments in Delhi.
Meanwhile, in a surprise development, the former Kolkata Municipal Corporation Mayor and Ms Mamata Banerjee’s close aide Firhad Hakim met Mr Ritabrata at the West Bengal Assembly on Monday. Also a former minister in the Mamata Banerjee government. Mr Hakim had submitted his resignation as the Kolkata mayor last week only after seeking clearance from Ms Banerjee.
Ms Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, who was upset with the party after being removed from the post of the Whip, said going by the people’s verdict, they believe that their “future political course should be aligned with the NDA.” Calling her removal “arbitrary” and “unilateral,” she told reporters that the party chairperson “may have announced my replacement from the post, but that does not alter the constitutional and parliamentary position overnight.”
She said the decision to form a separate bloc has come “after extensive discussions among fellow MPs. As of now, I remain the Chief Whip of the Trinamool in the Lok Sabha, and in that capacity, I have consulted colleagues before arriving at this decision,” she said. Rebel Trinamool MP Sharmila Sarkar said, “We are forming a different bloc of 20 MPs and going to give support to the NDA. Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar is our chief whip and Shatabdi Roy is our deputy leader.”
Mr Roy’s accusation of the party leadership was almost on the dotted lines of the charges levelled against the Mamata Banerjee government by the BJP leaders before the State Assembly elections. Mr Roy blasted at what he called “unbridled corruption” during the Trinamool regime, and said, “The people have given a huge mandate in favour of the BJP for the first time in the history of the state to put an end to 15-year anarchical rule of the Trinamool Congress arising out of widespread unbridled corruption, atrocities committed against women, abysmal failure in the fields of health, education, industry, law and order, employment, etc,” he said.
This comes at a time the Trinamool is facing a massive internal rebellion that threatens to split the party, soon after it lost the public mandate and the government in West Bengal. Ray reached Parliament this morning to tender his resignation. He also gave up his Trinamool membership. Though he did not explicitly declare if he would join the BJP, he appears ready to cross over to the ruling side. Hours after his exit, Ray paid a visit to BJP leader Bhupendra Yadav’s house. Chief MInister Suvendu Adhikari was also present there.
In his press note, Ray showered praises on West Bengal’s new BJP government, stating that it has started taking initiatives for overall development and reconstruction of West Bengal as per its election manifesto.
“In respectful acceptance of this historic verdict of the people, I have resigned today from the Rajya Sabha (Council of States) as a member and also from the primary membership of the All India Trinamool Congress,” he said. Ray later told reporters that the Trinamool leaders were so drunk on power that they believed they had become invincible.
The sources in the TMC rebel camp said at least 20 out of Trinamool’s 41 MPs from both Houses had been in touch with the BJP. However, Saugata Roy, a senior Trinamool MP, claimed he had received an offer to join the BJP, but he rejected it. “I will stay in the party on whose symbol I won the election,” he said.
