KOLKATA: TMC will abstain from voting process for Vice-President election scheduled to be held on August 6.
"We were not consulted when Margaret Alva’s name was decided. A senior leader of the opposition party tried to contact our party chief Mamata Banerjee when Alva’s name was already decided. So, we decided to abstain from voting process for Vice-President election," said Abhishek Banerjee.
Five days ago, NDA announced former West Bengal governor Jagdeep Dhankhar’s name as their candidate for Vice-President.
TMC supremo and West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee on Friday afternoon convened a meeting at her Kalighat residence to decide the party’s stance on the issue of Vice-President election.
"We have taken the decision of abstaining from voting process after discussing the issue with our MPs in today’s meeting. During the course of discussion, 85 per cent of our MPs opined that our party should abstain from voting process for Vice-President election," said Banerjee.
Banerjee, however, explained why the TMC will not support NDA’s candidate Dhankhar. "He was the Governor of West Bengal. During the tenure as the constitutional head of the state since 2019, the people of Bengal experienced how the image of the state was maligned by him. It was a unanimous decision that we will not support the NDA’s candidate and abstain from the voting process," said Banerjee.
After announcing Alva’s name four days ago, NCP chief Sharad Pawar said he had tried to contact TMC chief Mamata Banerjee but it could not be possible as she was busy in a conference.
The TMC, however, supported the opposition party’s Presidential candidate and former Union minister Yashwant Sinha. After the NDA’s announced Draupadi Murmu’s name as Presidential candidate, Mamata had said had the BJP discussed that they would nominate a tribal woman candidate, her party could have come to a consensus.