CPM MLA too quits for ‘right’ movement; Suvendu’s resignation from House not OK’d
A day after senior Trinamool Congress leaders Suvendu Adhikari and Jitendra Tiwari left the Bengal ruling outfit, two more legislators, one from TMC and the other from the CPI(M), quit their respective parties dropping hints of their rightward movement.
Sources close to Adhikari whose resignation from the Bengal Assembly was not immediately accepted by Speaker Biman Banerjee on “technical grounds” said he would join the BJP in the presence of Home Minister Amit Shah during his Saturday rally at Midnapore.
Adhikari has been summoned by Mamata to explain his position personally to him before considering his resignation. Shah is coming to Bengal on a two-day organisational trip.
“The letter he submitted personally to the Assembly secretariat has no date while the e-mailed letter to me contains a date ... this discrepancy has to be clarified by him for which I have asked him to meet me on December 21. Then only I will be able to accept his resignation. Till then he continues to be a TMC member of the House,” Mamata said.
Adhikari a former MP and Bengal Transport Minister later said he would meet the Speaker at the Assembly on the designated date.
The leader who had expressed concern about his personal safety and that of his followers was being provided with Z-category security by the Union Government sources said without providing further clarifications.
The other two leaders who on Friday left their respective parties are TMC legislator and Mukul Roy confidant Sil Bhadra Dutta and Tapasi Mandal a CPI(M) MLA from Haldia whose husband left the Marxist outfit on November 21.
Even as a video showing Mandal holding a closed-door parley with Bengal BJP president Dilip Ghosh went viral, the Marxist outfit promptly expelled her from the party where after she said, “It had become impossible to work with the CPI(M) and so I am leaving the party.”
She too is likely to join the BJP in presence of Shah on Saturday.
When contacted CPI(M) legislative party leader Sujan Chakrabarty said, “She must have done what she has done either out of some pressure or some lure … no it is for her to explain her stance to the people and not the party… currently the TMC and BJP are engaged in a dirty game of leader swapping that may not go down well with the people of the State.”
Meanwhile, Trinamool Congress top brass on Friday met at the Kalighat residence of Mamata apparently to weigh up the present political situation in Bengal against the backdrop of frequent desertion by party leaders.
The meeting that started late in the evening was had battle plans for the 2021 elections prime on its agenda said sources, adding efforts would also be taken to assuage the ruffled feelings in the party.