TMC Suffers Major Split as Nearly 20 MPs Decide to Support NDA

Amid deepening political crisis in the TMC, Senior MP Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar on Monday claimed that nearly 20 Lok Sabha MPs has decided to support the NDA and had communicated their position to Speaker Om Birla, triggering a split in the party's parliamentary unit . The development comes barely days after the TMC leadership suffered a setback in the West Bengal Assembly, where 58 of its 80 MLAs defied the party high command's decision to appoint veteran leader Sovandeb Chattopadhyay as the Leader of the Opposition, and elected expelled MLA Ritabrata Banerjee to that post. The political turbulence that has gripped the TMC since its Assembly election debacle appeared to spill over to its parliamentary ranks on Monday, with a group of dissident MPs extending support to the NDA even as party supremo Mamata Banerjee was in Delhi attending an INDIA bloc conclave to chart a pan-India strategy against the BJP. The dramatic development marks the first major split in the party's parliamentary wing since the TMC was founded and raises the prospect of a broader realignment within one of the country's largest opposition parties. Speaking to PTI over phone, Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar said 20 MPs had decided to support the NDA. "Nearly 20 TMC MPs, including me, have decided to support the NDA for Bengal's development. We have decided to write to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla and formally support the NDA," said the four-term MP, who resigned from all party posts last week. Later, speaking to a news channel, she claimed that a letter bearing the signatures of 20 MPs had already been sent to the Speaker. "The letter has already reached the Speaker. We have sought separate seating arrangements as a separate bloc," she said. Sources said the dissident MPs intend to argue before the Speaker that Ghosh Dastidar continues to be the valid chief whip of the party in the Lok Sabha and that subsequent changes announced by the party leadership were not completed through the required parliamentary procedure.