Twenty TMC MPs to merge with Nationalist Citizens Party, back NDA: Kakoli Ghosh

Trinamool Congress leader Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar said on Sunday that 20 of the party’s MPs will merge with the Tripura-based Nationalist Citizens Party and back the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance in the Lok Sabha, reported ANI.

Dastidar made the announcement after the MPs met with Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla earlier in the day.

This came soon after TMC MPs Kirti Azad and Sagarika Ghose handed over to Birla a letter by party National General Secretary Abhishek Banerjee against recognising any separate faction of the Trinamool Congress in the House.

The letter was initially sent to the speaker on Wednesday.

After meeting with Birla, Dastidar said that the rebel factions constitutes “more than two-thirds of our [TMC’s] total strength”.

Sudip Bandyopadhyay, who is among the 20 MPs, said that the 20 MPs will make the demand in July to give it the Trinamool Congress name since two-thirds of the party’s MPs are supporting it.

The Mamata Banerjee-led party has 28 MPs in the Lower House of Parliament. Although the TMC had won 29 seats in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the MP from Basirhat has since died and a bye-poll is yet to be held.

On June 8, led by Dastidar, 20 of the party’s MPs wrote to Birla, declaring their support for the ruling National Democratic Alliance.

Abhishek Banerjee’s letter

In his letter, Abhishek Banerjee told Birla that TMC should be treated as “a single political party represented in the House solely through its duly authorised leader and whip”.

While Abhishek Banerjee is the leader of TMC’s parliamentary party, Kalyan Banerjee is the appointed whip.

“The AITC [All India Trinamool Congress] is a single, indivisible political party,” wrote Abhishek Banerjee. “The legislative party in the Lok Sabha derives its very existence from, and remains an emanation of, the political party. There is in law only one AITC, one Leader of the Party in the House, and one Whip, all of whom hold office by authority of the political party and its competent organisational authority.”

Abhishek Banerjee told the speaker that the TMC should be given an opportunity to be heard before any decision is taken on the rebel faction’s request.

The party reserves its rights to initiate proceedings under the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution “in respect to any conduct falling foul of the provisions referred to herein”, he added.

The Tenth Schedule is an anti-defection provision that outlines the process by which MPs and MLAs can be disqualified for switching political parties.

Abhishek Banerjee wrote in his letter that the political party, and not the legislature party, is supreme.

Assuming without admitting in any manner that two-thirds of the legislative party has switched, “there has been no merger of the political party with any party or any creation of a new party called AITC”, he added.

The TMC has been facing internal divisions since it lost the West Bengal Assembly elections to the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Three of TMC’s Rajya Sabha MPs have resigned since Monday, and two of them quit the party.

Apart from the proceedings in Lok Sabha, at the state level, expelled MLA Ritabrata Banerjee has claimed that a group of 58 of TMC’s 80 legislators had been recognised as the party’s legislature wing in the Assembly.

The stand taken by the 58 MLAs is being viewed as a challenge to TMC chief Mamata Banerjee, who is supporting Sovandeb Chattopadhyay as the leader of the Opposition in the Assembly.

On June 3, the TMC dissolved all its committees and organisational units in the state, saying it would undertake a “comprehensive” review of its performance and party structure.

Edited by Sneha.

Also read: Why the Trinamool Congress is collapsing like a house of cards