Denied ticket by Trinamool Congress, 4 MLAs join BJP along with a nominated candidate

Denied ticket to contest Assembly elections 2021, four Trinamool Congress MLAs joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Monday.

Sonali Guha, MLA from Satgachhia, Rabindranath Bhattacharjee, MLA from Singur, Jatu Lahiri MLA from Shibpur and Dipendu Biswas, MLA from Basirhat Dakshin constituency joined the BJP in Kolkata. Another Trinamool Congress candidate, Sarala Murmu, who was named the party’s candidate from Malda’s Habibpur, also joined the BJP. Actor Tanushree also joined the BJP at the same programme in the BJP’s party office on Strand Road, Kolkata.

Of the four sitting MLAs, Jatu Lahiri and Rabindranath Bhattacharya were not nominated as candidates due to their age, as mentioned by Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee at the press conference. She said young candidates were being given preference. Both Jatu Lahiri and Rabindranath Bhattacharya are octogenarians.

Sonali Guha has been a long-time aide of Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee, and four-term MLA. The Satgachhia MLA was the first woman deputy speaker of the West Bengal Assembly. Guha went on TV interviews immediately after the Trinamool Congress list of candidates were announced on Friday and she was not made a candidate. She said that she had approached the BJP and wanted to work as an ordinary member of the party and did not want a ticket to contest elections. However, sources say that the BJP may offer her a ticket to contest the polls. Elections are scheduled in Bengal from March 27 to April 29. The BJP has so far released names of 57 candidates for the first two phase of elections, while Trinamool has released names of all 291 candidates (three seats are for ally Gorkha Janmukti Morcha). Many sitting MLAs openly spoke of their grouses on not being nominated by the Trinamool immediately after the candidate list was announced.

On Monday morning, the Trinamool Congress issued a press release saying that their candidate for Malda’s Habibpur, Sarala Murmu, had to be replaced “due to her ill health”. Pradeep Baskey was named the candidate in her place. However, Murmu later claimed that she was joining the BJP as grassroots workers of her party had joined the BJP.