TMC crisis deepens as 20 MPs back NDA, dealing blow to Mamata Banerjee

TMC MP Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar wrote to LS Speaker declaring support. PIC/X/@_Epinephrine_

The crisis engulfing the TMC deepened on Monday as 20 Lok Sabha MPs, led by Chief Whip Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, wrote to Speaker Om Birla declaring support for the BJP-led NDA, triggering a split in the party's parliamentary unit and dealing a severe blow to Mamata Banerjee's authority after the party's Assembly poll debacle.

The development comes barely days after the TMC leadership suffered a setback, 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.

Meanwhile, veteran TMC Rajya Sabha MP Sukhendu Shekhar Ray on Monday resigned from the party and stepped down as a member of the Upper House, dealing a fresh blow to the Mamata Banerjee-led outfit amid growing signs that the turbulence in its legislative wing may now be spilling over to its parliamentary ranks.

TMC leader arrested

Trinamool Congress leader Jahangir Khan was on Monday arrested near the India-Nepal border in north Bengal on "extortion" charges, police said. The Calcutta High Court had on May 26 rejected an interim protection granted to Khan, against whom seven FIRs were registered in South 24 Parganas district. Details with regard to the arrest were, however, not divulged by the police.

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