Rebel TMC MPs meet Speaker over NCPI seating in Lok Sabha

Lok Sabha MPs Sudip Bandyopadhyay and Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, who have left the Trinamool Congress (TMC) and joined the Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI), have met Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla and discussed seating arrangements for the party’s 20 MPs in the Lower House of Parliament, sources said on Tuesday.

During their meeting with the speaker on Monday, the NCPI leaders also discussed the allotment of a party office in the new Parliament building, the sources said.

The MPs who have switched to the NCPI have informed Birla that they have designated Bandyopadhyay as their floor leader, Satabdi Roy as the deputy leader and Ghosh Dastidar as the chief whip.

The meeting comes ahead of the Monsoon session of Parliament and amid the process of according parliamentary recognition to the NCPI as a constituent in the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

Bandyopadhyay also met Home Minister Amit Shah recently, a source said.

The sources said the NCPI is expected to submit a formal communication to the Speaker’s Office for according parliamentary recognition to it. The leaders are also likely to join an all-party meeting on July 19.

The meeting with the speaker assumes significance as petitions have been filed by the TMC, seeking the disqualification of the 20 MPs who have left the party and joined the NCPI.

TMC leader in the Lok Sabha, Abhishek Banerjee, has met Birla and submitted 20 separate petitions, seeking the disqualification of the rebel MPs under the 10th Schedule of the Constitution.

He has argued that the MPs have voluntarily given up their membership of the TMC by joining another party and are, therefore, liable to be disqualified.

He has also urged the speaker not to accord any recognition, status or facility to any group claiming to be a separate faction of the TMC.

The sources said the issue of the disqualification petitions did not come up during Monday’s meeting of the MPs with the speaker.