‘Feeling suffocated’ — Trinamool MP Dinesh Trivedi resigns from Rajya Sabha, could quit party

There is strong speculation that Dinesh Trivedi could join the BJP. There is no official confirmation from Trinamool on his resignation yet.

TMC MP Dinesh Trivedi resigned from the Rajya Sabha Friday | ANI

New Delhi: Veteran Trinamool Congress leader and former railway minister Dinesh Trivedi Friday announced his resignation from the Rajya Sabha, saying he is “feeling suffocated” seeing the violence in his state of West Bengal and his “inability to do anything”.

Participating in the budget discussion in the Rajya Sabha, Trivedi said he will continue to work for Bengal. Though the former railway minister did not say if he will continue in the Trinamool Congress, there is strong speculation that he might jump ship to the BJP.

There was no official confirmation from the Trinamool Congress on Trivedi’s resignation at the time of publishing this report.

However, Sukhendu Sekhar Roy, a senior Trinamool leader in Rajya Sabha, said in an official statement: “Trinamool means grassroots. This will give us an opportunity to send a ‘grassroots’ worker of ours soon to the Rajya Sabha.”

Soon after the Rajya Sabha session got over, he told reporters that he is quitting Trinamool.

‘Will continue to work for Bengal’

Trivedi said he comes from the land of Rabindranath Tagore, Subhash Chandra Bose and Khudiram Bose, and hence he can’t continue to sit silent when his state “is witnessing so much violence”.

“What can I do? My actions are limited. There is party discipline… but I am grateful to my party that they have sent me here,” Trivedi said.

Citing lines from Vivekananda’s poem, he further said his soul is telling him that if he can’t do anything from where he is, he should leave his post.

“Vivekananda said arise, awake and stop not till the goal is reached. So I have decided to resign but I will continue to work for Bengal,” Trivedi said in his address.

If Trivedi joins BJP, he would be the latest in a slew of senior and middle-level Trinamool Congress leaders who have joined the BJP in recent months, ahead of the assembly elections. They include former West Bengal ministers Suvendu Adhikari and Rajib Banerjee, former Howrah mayor Rathin Chakraborty, among others.

Not first time there is speculation about Trivedi joining BJP

This is, however, not the first time that speculation about Trivedi joining the BJP has surfaced.

In January 2015, Trivedi had openly criticised the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool government while attending a function in Gujarat, where he shared the dais with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s brother. At the event, he had also praised Modi for “transforming India’s image internationally”.

Trivedi started his political career with the Congress in the 1980s. He joined the Janata Dal for a while. In the late 90s, he joined the Trinamool Congress when Mamata Banerjee formed the party after leaving the Congress.

Trivedi became the Union railway minister in 2011 soon after Mamata Banerjee took over as West Bengal CM. The Trinamool Congress was part of the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance back then.

There was, however, a controversial end to his tenure a year later. Miffed over Trivedi announcing a passenger fare hike in the railway budget, Banerjee wrote to the then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to replace him with another Trinamool leader, Mukul Roy. Trivedi sent in his resignation as railway minister soon after.

Trivedi was sent to the Rajya Sabha after he lost to BJP’s Arjun Singh from Barrackpore Lok Sabha seat in the 2019 elections.