Kolkata, Sep 14 (PTI) Rebel TMC MP Jagadish Chandra Barma Basunia on Monday claimed that 17 of the 20 Lok Sabha members aligned with the Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI) will join the BJP before or after Durga Puja, a claim promptly disputed by fellow dissidents.
The BJP sought to distance itself from the claim, with its West Bengal unit chief Samik Bhattacharya saying the party would not take in anyone merely because they want to join it.
Lashing out at the dissident TMC MPs, the party’s Mamata Banerjee camp called the move “an act of traitors” who have “sacrificed principles at the altar of political opportunism”.
Basunia said 17 MPs have finalised plans to join the BJP together and the number would be sufficient to keep them outside the purview of the anti-defection law.
“Seventeen of our MPs are going to the BJP together. Since more than two-thirds of the 20 members will be switching, the anti-defection law will not apply to us,” he told reporters.
Of the TMC’s 27 Lok Sabha MPs, 20 have joined the little-known NCPI and extended support to the BJP after TMC’s defeat in the assembly polls in May this year.
The TMC leadership, headed by Mamata Banerjee, has submitted an application to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla and moved the Supreme Court as well, seeking their disqualification as MPs.
However, fellow rebel MP Satabdi Roy said no such decision has been taken by the group so far and the Cooch Behar MP had made the remarks in his personal capacity.
Abu Taher Khan, who is also part of the NCPI group, said Basunia had no right to speak on behalf of all the MPs who had joined the outfit.
He also rejected Basunia’s claim that he, Jangipur MP Khalilur Rahaman and Baharampur MP Yusuf Pathan would support the NDA from outside.
“We will not go to the BJP. We will not go to the NDA. This is clear,” Taher said.
The parliamentarian from the Murshidabad seat said he and the two MPs could attend government meetings if invited by the PM or the CM for development-related issues, but would not participate in BJP or NDA meetings.
Basunia had claimed the three MPs belonging to the minority community would not formally join the BJP because of the political dynamics in their constituencies, but would support the NDA from outside and could be given important responsibilities or portfolios.
The BJP, meanwhile, distanced itself from the claim. West Bengal BJP spokesperson Debjit Sarkar said he had no information about any such development and maintained that a person expressing a desire to join the BJP did not mean the party would automatically take him in.
Bhattacharya said the party would not take in anyone merely because they wanted to join, and questioned whether the BJP Basunia was referring to was “the BJP on Mars”.
“As far as I know, no one from the TMC or NCPI is joining the BJP. People of the state have not forgotten the kind of atrocities these leaders and MPs have done during the TMC regime,” he said.
Kunal Ghosh, spokesperson of the Mamata Banerjee-led TMC camp, alleged the dissident leaders “are acting as BJP agents”.
“We have been saying this from the very beginning. They themselves do not know where they stand today. Their objective is to enter BJP. We have seen them going from door to door in Delhi, meeting BJP leaders,” Ghosh said.
He alleged that the MPs won on TMC tickets, garnering anti-BJP votes and then went on to “act as BJP agents”.
“Since the matter is before the court, I will not comment on it. Our supremo Mamata Banerjee and lawyer-MP Kalyan Banerjee are handling it. But talking of this lack of principles, they are knocking on BJP doors – what kind of political principle is that? How much further into a despicable and dirty space are they going to drag politics into?” he said.
Ghosh argued that the prospect was not merely a betrayal of Mamata Banerjee or the TMC but a “betrayal of every person who voted against the BJP”.
“And then there are all these stories about NCPI, this and that. It is such a big plot. The more they speak, the more foul smell comes out; the more the rot, filth, greed, opportunism and political defections behind this politics become evident,” Ghosh said.
They are directionless, without principles and their political careers are over, he claimed.
“They have no connection with the people. The people of Bengal are rejecting these traitors. They are sitting on one branch, then moving to another and then another,” the TMC MLA added.
Asked about the stand conveyed by the state BJP chief of not allowing TMC leaders into the saffron fold, Ghosh accused Bhattacharya of paying mere lip service.
“Look, Samik Bhattacharya is like the statutory warning printed on a cigarette packet. In other words, whatever he says, we subsequently see those very things happening, irrespective of the warning he issues,” he claimed.
On June 14, 20 dissident TMC Lok Sabha MPs announced their merger with the little-known NCPI and extended support to the BJP-led NDA. They subsequently sought recognition as a separate parliamentary group.
The rebel camp has maintained that the move constitutes a valid merger and has invoked the two-thirds provision under the anti-defection law. With 20 MPs in the group, at least 14 would be required to meet that threshold.
Basunia said the MPs had originally intended to move directly to the BJP but were brought into the NCPI after three minority MPs were unwilling to join.
The legal status of the group, however, remains contested. Lok Sabha records continue to list the 20 MPs as TMC members, and their claim for recognition as a separate NCPI group has not been finally settled.
TMC leader Abhishek Banerjee had approached the Supreme Court seeking expeditious disposal of his petition seeking disqualification of the 20 MPs under the anti-defection law.
The Supreme Court has issued notices to the 20 MPs in the matter.
Basunia and his wife, TMC MLA Sangeeta Roy, faced protests when they returned to his ancestral home in Cooch Behar amid anger over his political shift. A TMC office near his residence was also allegedly set on fire. PTI PNT SUS PNT NSD SMY NN
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