Accusing the BJP of trying to poach TMC MLAs by attempting to bribe them, Banerjee, without naming anyone, said some people are acting as fence-sitters who are under the illusion that the saffron party might come to power in the state.
Moderate turnout was recorded in the first four hours of polling across five assembly constituencies across Punjab, West Bengal, Gujarat and Kerala where bypolls are underway on Thursday.
A Trinamool Congress legislator on Sunday threatened to not support any bill tabled by the government in the West Bengal Assembly in the future and abstain from voting in the upcoming Rajya Sabha polls in the state if 'atrocities' on his loyalists allegedly by a rival faction continued, even as the Bharatiya Janata Party said the collapse of the Mamata Banerjee government was just a matter of time.
The Trinamool Congress on Monday lost five more sitting MLAs and the control of the Malda Zilla Parishad to the Bharatiya Janata Party as defections continued to rock West Bengal's ruling party ahead of the assembly polls.
The desertion by more than two-thirds of the Congress legislative party makes TMC, a newbie in Meghalaya, the principal opposition in the Northeastern state.
'The police could not save my daughter or bring her justice, but they didn't think twice about beating up women and elderly persons.'
The development is a major boost for West Bengal Chief Minister and TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee, who has been trying to expand her party's footprint beyond her native state.
The violence, which erupted over the setting up of a shop in Maheshtala under Rabindranagar police station in South 24 Parganas district, quickly escalated, turning the area into a virtual battlefield.
The Narada sting tapes, made public before the 2016 assembly elections in West Bengal, were claimed to have been shot in 2014, wherein people resembling TMC ministers, MPs and MLAs were allegedly seen receiving money from representatives of a fictitious company in lieu of promised favours.
'We are pleased to announce the candidature of @sagarikaghose, @SushmitaDevAITC, @MdNadimulHaque6 and Mamata Bala Thakur for the forthcoming Rajya Sabha elections,' the party said in a tweet.
Guha's remark drew a sharp reaction from the BJP, which termed it as an 'insult to the security forces'.
Roy's comments comes amid several TMC councillors returning to the party after switching to the BJP.
Amid the ongoing impasse over the swearing-in of two newly elected Trinamool Congress MLAs, Speaker Biman Banerjee on Thursday summoned a special session of the West Bengal Assembly and asserted that the functioning of the House is not solely dependent on the Governor.
Six Bharatiya Janata Party MLAs, including Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari, were suspended from the West Bengal assembly over staging protests in the House in view of unrest in Sandeshkhali.
Stating that there will be a 'big khela' in West Bengal, Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Agnimitra Paul on Tuesday claimed that the Trinamool Congress-led state government would not survive after December this year.
The internal party exchange unfolded amid an ongoing purported discord among party veterans, recognised as loyalists of Mamata Banerjee, and the younger generation, perceived as close to her nephew Abhishek.
The Election Commission of India has announced that elections for 10 Rajya Sabha seats in Goa, Gujarat, and West Bengal will be held on July 24.
Trinamool Congress general secretary Abhishek Banerjee along with party leaders and workers sat on a dharna at the Rajghat in New Delhi on Mahatma Gandhi's birth anniversary on Monday demanding the release of funds for West Bengal by the Centre.
Cricketer Yusuf Pathan will contest from the Baharampur Lok Sabha seat, whereas Kirti Aazd will fight from the Bardhaman-Durgapur constituency.
An angry Banerjee slammed a minister, a former Trinamool Congress mayor and a few bureaucrats for their "below-par performance".
Navigating a history of animosity and mistrust, negotiations for a potential Congress-Trinamool Congress alliance in West Bengal face significant challenges while addressing the shared adversary of the Bharatiya Janata Party, with the Bengal Congress unit appearing reluctant to engage in an electoral pact.
District health officials said that these leaders are all associated with different hospitals as members of the Patients' Welfare Committees, making them eligible for the vaccination programme in the first round.
Asked about her potential successor, Banerjee deflected the question with a counter-query to the interviewer, "Who is your successor?"
The West Bengal assembly on Tuesday plunged into bedlam with ruling Trinamool Congress and Left members coming to blows and the speaker suspending three Left MLAs, while three injured members were taken to hospital.
The TMC general secretary, considered number two in the party, shared the letter sent to him by the central agency on X, formerly Twitter.
They are actively engaging with the party leadership for the past some time but the party is yet to take a call, the sources said, adding the MPs include one from the north of the country and one from south.
Local women with sticks and brooms in their hands took out processions in different areas of Sandeshkhali as the protests intensified on the second day on Friday.
Modifying the single bench order, the division bench presided by Justice I P Mukerji directed that Banerjee and Ghosh will be free to make any statement concerning the Governor, not crossing the contours of freedom of speech and expression and public duty.
Fish sellers of Chittranjan Park found themselves in a state of disbelief last week when the anti-meat overdrive of the Hindu right hit the local markets with a warning to shut shops because they were close to a temple.
Later on while speaking to the reporters, Leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari said the BJP legislators were forced to stage protest as there was no mention of post-poll violence in the speech copy circulated among the MLAs.
West Bengal minister Bachchu Hansda and Tehatta MLA Gouri Sankar Dutta joined the Bharatiya Janata Party on Wednesday after being denied nominations for the assembly polls by the Trinamool Congress.
The Congress on Tuesday suffered a major upset in Himachal Pradesh at the hands of the Bharatiya Janata Party in the Rajya Sabha elections which were marred by cross-voting in all the three states though it won three seats in Karnataka while the saffron party pocketed an extra seat in Uttar Pradesh.
Chatterjee, who also held several portfolios in the Banerjee government as a minister, lauded Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP president Amit Shah for their bold leadership and said there should be no place for negative politics, an apparent attack on TMC supremo.
As state minister Suvendu Adhikari, along with other functionaries, openly air grievances against the Mamata Banerjee-led dispensation, senior leaders are frantically looking for ways to pacify the rebels.
'I did get a ticket, but getting nominated isn't enough.' 'The people in Habibpur, my own party workers, are my opponents.' 'Is it possible to win?'
BJP MLA from Kaliagnaj Soumen Roy Saturday joined the ruling TMC, becoming the fourth saffron party legislator to do so since the West Bengal assembly poll results were declared in May.
This is a complete betrayal of the mandate of the people of the Sagardighi Assembly constituency, Ramesh said on Twitter.
The juggernaut of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance, which triumphed in three of the four east and north-eastern states that went for assembly bypolls on Saturday, was halted yet again in West Bengal where Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress registered a six-on-six clean sweep.
The electoral exercise, the first since the Lok Sabha elections, will decide the fate of many veterans and some debutantes including Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu's wife Kamlesh Thakur.
The resolution under Rule 169 was tabled in the assembly, proposing to observe Poila Baisakh, as "Bangla Diwas" and Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore's Banglar Mati, Banglar Jol (Bengal's soil, Bengal's water) as the state song.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances