Setback for Mamata Banerjee; Mukul Roy quits TMC, may join BJP..?
KOLKATA : In a big jolt to the West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, Trinamool Congress leader Mukul Roy on Monday resigned from the party’s working committee.
Roy said he will formally resign from the party after Durga Puja. “After Durga Puja, I will resign from the party and the post of MP,” said Roy.
Addressing a press conference, Mukul Roy said, “With a heavy heart, I am announcing that I will quit the primary party post of Trinamool Congress and the Rajya Sabha membership.
I will formally resign after the Durga Puja break.” He added that he would reveal the reason behind his decision after Durga Puja. Mr Roy, a member of parliament, met with top BJP leaders in Delhi late last month, adding to the perception that he was “getting close to the BJP”, said sources.
The BJP has acknowledged that Mr Roy has been in touch with its leaders. “I came to know that Mr. Roy is in touch with our central leaders. We will consider it if he wishes to join BJP,” said West Bengal BJP president Dilip Ghosh over the weekend.
Mukul Roy’s announcement came three days after West Bengal’s ruling Trinamool Congress issued a strict warning to him that the party was keeping a close watch on his purported meetings with Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders. Apart from meeting BJP leaders, Roy had last week sent back the state police personnel providing him Z-category security cover, after party supremo Mamata Banerjee, in a recent organisational reshuffle, abolished the Vice President’s post he had been holding for over a year
Roy was also kept away from several party programmes and sacked as the party in-charge of Tripura.For long considered the second-in-command of Banerjee’s TMC and credited as the architect of its electoral successes, Roy first fell out with the party following his grilling by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in January 2015 in connection with the Saradha ponzi scam.
As Roy – a former railway minister – started skipping Trinamool meetings, Banerjee stripped him of all his posts and relegated him to the Rajya Sabha backbenches. There was much speculation of Roy may join BJP. In subsequent months, Roy regained a substantial portion of his earlier clout and was made the party Vice President in 2016. He was one of the generals of the party in the 2016 Assembly polls, which Trinamool won with ease. (with Agency Inputs).
