At least five sitting Trinamool Congress MLAs have joined the BJP after they were denied tickets to seek re-election in the upcoming assembly polls in the state. These MLAs are Sonali Guha, Dipendu Biswas, Jatu Lahiri, Sital Sardar, and Rabindranath Bhattacharya.
Four-term MLA Guha was believed to be a close aide of Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee but she decided to jump switch her allegiance to the BJP after her name did not figure in the list of candidates released by the Trinamool Congress.
Mamata Banerjee had released the list of 291 candidates for the upcoming assembly polls last week.
80-year-old Rabindranath Bhattacharya had gained fame during the Singur movement that brought the downfall of the then Left Front government headed by Buddhadeb Bhattacharya. His decision to join the saffron camp also emanated from the denial of the election ticket.
According to news agency PTI, another four-time legislator, 85-year-old Jatu Lahiri, and former footballer Dipendu Biswas, who was elected to the state assembly for the first time in 2016, too joined the BJP after being denied election tickets. They joined the BJP in the presence of BJP’s Bengal unit chief Dilip Ghosh, Suvendu Adhikari and Mukul Roy. Both Adhikari and Roy were close confidantes of Mamata Banerjee until they deserted her to join the BJP.
Another Trinamool MLA joining the BJP was Sital Sardar. Sardar followed Sarala Murmu joined the BJP after she was replaced by Pradeep Baskey in the Habibpur constituency on Monday morning.
This came even as the BJP wrested the control from the Trinamool Congress in the 38-member Malda Zilla Parishad of Malda after its 22 members changed sides.
Assembly elections in the state will be held in eight phases with the first phase of the voting scheduled for 27 March. The counting will take place on 2 May.