KOLKATA: Rift within the Trinamool Congress (TMC) deepened as MLAs loyal to Mamata Banerjee were not invited to an all-party meeting convened ahead of the Budget Session, while members of the party's rebel camp led by Leader of Opposition Ritabrata Banerjee received invitations.
Party MLAs Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay and Kunal Ghosh were not allegedly asked to attend the meetings of the Business Affairs (BA) Committee and then the all-party meet.
While rebel TMC MLAs led by Ritabrata Banerjee, legislators Mostafizur Rahaman belonging to the CPI-M, Nawsad Siddiqui of Indian Secular Front (ISF) and Humayun Kabir of Aam Janata Unnayan Party (AJUP) were invited to the all-party meet.
Political observers felt that the Assembly’s decision not to invite Chattapadhyay, a veteran Trinamool Congress MLA, and Ghosh to the meeting suggested that a new political equation is expected to emerge in the House, in the BJP government’s regime in the state.
The Assembly invited Ritabrata in view of the rebel Trinamool Congress camp's strength of 65 legislators in the House, observers felt.
The state finance minister, Dr Swapan Dasgupta, attended the meeting.
On Monday, Ritabrata fueled speculation about a split in the Trinamool Congress following the party's crushing defeat to the BJP in the recent state assembly elections.
He had told reporters at the Assembly complex that the number of dissident MLAs in the house has gone up to 65, though he didn’t divulge anything about the names of new legislators who have joined the camp officially.
Interestingly, he held a close-door meeting at the assembly complex with Firhad Hakim, Trinamool MLA from Kolkata Port and former mayor the Kolkata Municipal Corporation, intensifying the speculation.
Earlier, Abhishek Banerjee, national general secretary of the Trinamool Congress and MP from Diamond Harbour, had written a letter armed with a resolution of the meeting with the party supremo and former Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee at Harish Chatterjee Street residence to the Spekar Rathindranath Bose selecting Chattapadhyay as the LoP in the Trinamool legislature party.
The resolution was signed by the party MLAs.
The controversy erupted after claims surfaced that signatures of several MLAs were affixed to a related resolution copy despite their absence from the meeting held at Mamata’s residence, sparking a political row in West Bengal and prompting the Suvendu Adhikari government to conduct an investigation by the Criminal Investigation Department to probe alleged signature forgery.
Based on the complaint lodged by two rebel Trinamool Congress MLAs, Ritabrata Bandyopadhyay from Uluberia Purba in Howrah and Sandipan Saha from Entally in the city, with the speaker, an FIR was filed by the House with Hare Street police station.
The party leadership expelled both Badyopadhyay and Saha on charges of anti-party activities.
With the directive of the Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari, a special investigation team (SIT) under the CID was formed to probe the alleged signature forgery case.
The SIT had interrogated several MLAs who have reportedly admitted that their signatures were affixed to the resolution copy, though they were absent in the meeting at Kalighat residence of Mamata Banerjee.
The Speaker recognised Ritabrata as the LoP and MLA Akhruzzaman, as the Chief Whip in the assembly after 58 rebel MLAs wrote a letter to the former.
