West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s troubles seem to be increasing. On Thursday (July 2), a group of rebel Trinamool Congress MPs met the Election Commission (EC) and claimed that they have the support of two-thirds of the party MLAs. After the meeting, Ritabrata Banerjee said, “Our delegation had held a meeting in Kolkata on June 22, in which a national committee was elected. We had informed the Election Commission about this on June 23 and had requested for a meeting. More than two-thirds of the All India Trinamool Congress MLAs are with us; councilors and Zilla Parishad members are also with us.”
‘Our fight is against dictatorship’
He further said, “Our fight is against the culture that has turned the party into a family-run institution at the grassroots level; it is a fight against dictatorship. Our fight is against those who run syndicates. This result is a stand against corruption.”
Ritabrata’s emphasis: We are the real TMC
Talking about the split in the party, Banerjee said, “There is no question of split in the Trinamool Congress, because *we* are the real Trinamool Congress. We have told this to the Election Commission; it does not matter to us what Mamata Banerjee or Abhishek Banerjee says. We had informed the Election Commission about this through a letter on June 23.”
Ritabrata Banerjee claimed support of 64 MLAs
Trinamool Congress has a total of 80 MLAs in the 294-member West Bengal Assembly. Ritabrata Banerjee recently claimed the support of 64 MLAs. At the same time, the real Trinamool Congress, loyal to party chief Mamata Banerjee and Abhishek Banerjee, currently has the support of only 20 MLAs. Meanwhile, the CID is also probing alleged irregularities in the signatures of some MLAs on a resolution submitted to the Assembly Speaker – the resolution appointing Sovandeb Chattopadhyay as the leader of the opposition, Asima Patra and Naina Bandyopadhyay as deputy leaders of the opposition and Firhad Hakim as the chief whip of the Trinamool Legislative Party.
CID started investigation
The CID started investigation after the issue of alleged irregularities in the signatures of Ritabrata Banerjee and Sandipan Saha was raised. Shortly thereafter, Trinamool Congress suspended both the leaders. Following this, 60 MLAs rebelled under the leadership of Ritabrata Banerjee; Claiming to represent the majority faction, he presented a new proposal to the Speaker. The Speaker accepted this new proposal and officially accepted Ritabrata Banerjee as the leader of the opposition.