NEW DELHI: As the official faction and rebel MPs of the Trinamool Congress (TMC) are set for a long legal fight, it was learnt that Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla is likely to seek legal opinion on the issue.
The dissident group met Birla on Sunday and urged him to recognize them as a separate group after its planned merger with the Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI).
Any decision on the TMC rebel group's demand will be taken before the Monsoon session of Parliament, which usually commences in the third week of July, said sources.
The decision on the demand of the TMC rebels will be based on the written opinion of the Union law ministry, which will give it after consulting a senior law officer.
Legal opinion in writing will be sought so that the Speaker's final decision if challenged in court can withstand judicial scrutiny, sources said.
A former Election Commission officer, who dealt with political parties in the poll authority, described the current plan of the TMC rebels to merge with the NCPL as an "innovation" that has no mention in either the anti-defection law or the Representation of the People Act.
Meanwhile, former secretary general of the Lok Sabha and constitutional expert PDT Achary cited paragraph 4 of the 10th Schedule of the Constitution to underline that only a political party is allowed to merge with another political party and just MPs or MLAs cannot merge.
He said that if the leadership of a political party decides to merge with another political party, its MLAs and MPs have to agree on the merger "but MPs or the MLAs alone cannot merge with another political party... this is the Constitutional provision".
Meanwhile, speaking to the media, a senior functionary of the NCPI questioned the decision, claiming the party leadership had never been consulted on the move and that such a decision could not be taken unilaterally.
NCPI national secretary Shantanu Dey said the party president had not discussed any merger proposal with other office-bearers and suggested that the decision lacked organisational approval.
"The party president never spoke about the merger within the party. Such decisions cannot be taken by himself," Dey told television channels, indicating possible differences within the organisation over the dramatic political development that has thrust the obscure party into the national spotlight.
Dey also said the NCPI's political activities were largely confined to Tripura and that the party had never been an active force in West Bengal.
"Although the party was registered in West Bengal in 2023, the state has never been among our principal areas of operation," he said.