Veteran Trinamool Congress (TMC) MP Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar and several party MLAs attended the administrative meetings chaired by BJP leaders on Tuesday, triggering fresh speculation over unrest within the TMC after its defeat in the recent assembly elections.
Dastidar, along with TMC MLAs Anisur Rahaman Bidesh, Bina Mondal and Abdul Matin Muhammad, attended a meeting chaired by CM Suvendu Adhikari in Nadia district.
“We never got any calls (to attend administrative meetings) in the last five years. But I said on the first day (after coming to power) that we would invite all legislators of the areas concerned and some selected MPs. Today the MP of Barasat was invited. She attended the meeting. Some legislators of the opposition party (TMC) also joined,” Adhikari said.
“She (Dastidar) was allowed to speak. She cooperated. Shook hands. She said that she had been invited to such meetings (organised by the previous TMC-government) even in the past but was never allowed to speak. We want the people to reap the benefits of the double-engine government. Let rivalry stay only during the polls,” he added.
“It’s an administrative meeting. The administration is for everyone. It is not a party meeting,” Dastidar told reporters before attending the event.
{{/usCountry}}“It’s an administrative meeting. The administration is for everyone. It is not a party meeting,” Dastidar told reporters before attending the event.
{{/usCountry}}The developments come days after Dastidar resigned as TMC’s Barasat district president and publicly blamed corruption for the party’s electoral defeat.
She was removed by the TMC as the party’s chief whip in the Lok Sabha. In the meeting she was seen sharing the dais with Adhikari and other cabinet ministers of the newly formed BJP government. In north Bengal’s Siliguri, 13 TMC MLAs attended another administrative meeting chaired by BJP MLA and former Union minister Nisith Pramanik.
No TMC leader replied to HT’s calls or messages.