In another setback to the BJP in West Bengal, the party’s National Vice President Mukul Roy is rumoured to join the Trinamool Congress on Friday. Speculations over Roy quitting the BJP gained momentum this week when he skipped a key party meet in Kolkata.
Quoting sources, NDTV reported that Mukul Roy was feeling suffocated in the party, adding that the BJP’s defeat in the just-concluded assembly polls compounded his frustration.
Roy, whose son Shubranshu is already rumoured to join the Trinamool, on Wednesday had skipped a key party meeting in Kolkata. The development comes close on the heels of the Trinamool’s claim that as many as 35 BJP MLAs were keen to leave the saffron party.
Last week, Mamata Banerjee’s nephew Abhishek Banerjee had visited a Kolkata hospital to inquire about Mukul Roy’s ailing wife. Abhishek Banerjee, who was recently promoted to a key role within the Trinamool Congress, meeting Mukul Roy had given credence to speculation that all was not well between Mukul Roy and the BJP.
As reported by Janta Ka Reporter earlier, scores of BJP MLAs and other BJP leaders, who left the Trinamool to join the saffron party before the assembly polls, were now keen to return to their old party.
Another Trinamool defector to BJP, Rajib Banerjee, on Tuesday took to Facebook to warn his own party to desist from harassing the Mamata Banerjee government after losing the polls. He wrote in Bengali that constantly harassing the government led by Banerjee with a threat to impose Article 356 in the state would not go down well with the people of Bengal.
Many believe that the BJP’s decision to promote Suvendu Adhikari, another former loyalist of Mamata Banerjee, in Bengal may have prompted Roy to consider returning to his former party. Roy has not made any formal statement on his possible return to the Trinamool Congress.