CALCUTTA: Former Bengal Minister and Mamata Banerjee’s assistant separated Suvendu Adhikari leave Trinamool Congress on Thursday, taking the third and possibly final step in his journey to BJP and opening the floodgates for a slew of resignations from his loyalists and at least one disgruntled top colleague: West Burdwan’s MLA Jitendra Tiwari.
By night, rumors of discontent had escalated into a roar of rebellion that divided Trinamool-led civic corps in West Burdwan and Hooghly, as well as shaking the party organization in Adhikari’s home turf, East Midnapore and Jangalmahal. . In Hooghly, Dankuni Township Vice President Debashis Mukherjee resigned from his civic position and announced that he was with “Dada”.
In West Midnapore, the president of the Trinamool Kishan-Khet Mazdoor cell, Dulal Mandal, presented his papers. Pandabeswar MLA Tiwari, who had challenged CM Mamata Banerjee’s directive not to attend any rallies or meetings until they met on Friday cited an alleged attack on his West Burdwan office in Haripur by TMC bloc chair Narendranath Chakraborty for leaving the party immediately.
Following suit, three top Tiwari supporters, including the West Burdwan TMC secretary general and a district vice president, resigned. Four rank-and-file party workers also posted their newspapers. Adhikari’s separation from the party with which he had been associated for more than two decades was set in motion on November 27, when he left Mamata Banerjee’s cabinet and other administrative posts.
He continued with his resignation from the assembly on Wednesday. “I am grateful for all the challenges and opportunities that are given to me,” Adhikari said in a letter to Mamata. He did not mention any grievance or resentment either with the party or with his former colleagues. With the final parting of the roads just two days before Union Interior Minister Amit Shah’s scheduled visit to Midnapore, Adhikari appears ready to make his much-speculated transition to the saffron festival at that very event.
Trinamool called his resignation “a drama about a late awakening of consciousness.” “BJP veterans will not have a chair in their party office, given the way these BJP ‘tatkal’ leaders are flocking to their party,” said TMC spokesman Kunal Ghosh.
BJP head of state Dilip ghosh He said this was the beginning of a process that would end with everyone except CM Mamata, nephew and MP Abhishek Banerjee, and State Minister for Urban Development Firhad Hakim, leaving the party. Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar He appeared to get into the controversy, forwarding CM Mamata a letter written by Adhikari in which he allegedly speaks of his apprehensions about being harassed by state government agencies.
(With input from Mohammad Asif, Suman Mandal, Falguni Banerjee, Subhro Maitra and Sujoy Khanra)
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