Raising slogans against the Bharatiya Janata Party, Trinamool Congress (TMC) leaders ended their 24-hour protest at the Mandir Marg police station in New Delhi on Tuesday evening, a day after they were detained while staging a dharna outside the Election Commission's office.
The TMC-led West Bengal government has already started laying the groundwork for the election, setting the tone with the recent Bengal Global Business Summit and the state Budget.
Three TMC leaders Amit Mitra, Bratya Basu and Rathin Ghosh were sworn-in virtually. Mitra is unwell and both Basu and Ghosh are recuperating from COVID-19.
Veteran Trinamool Congress leader Mukul Roy, who has expressed his desire to work for the Bharatiya Janata Party in future, on Wednesday said he is a soldier of the saffron camp, and there is no question of resigning from the Trinamool Congress as he was never 'mentally' with the party even after rejoining it in 2021.
Though he has physically improved, his doctors remained unsure of his mental functioning.
The BJP, which has emerged as the main opposition party in West Bengal after winning 77 seats in the assembly polls last year, failed to win even a single civic body.
"My decision to join the BJP was a wrong one and I can feel that today. I did not bother to tell the BJP about leaving that party. I always felt unwanted there. They tried to use me and asked me to badmouth Mamata-di. I could not do that," she said.
Saifuddin Laskar (47), TMC area president of Bamungachi area in Joynagar was shot dead from close range near his house by miscreants when he went out to offer prayers in the morning, the police said.
Roy, on his part, said the decision to name him in the first information report was 'politically motivated'.
'The Congress can exist without (someone from) the Nehru-Gandhi family being its president.'
The recent controversy unfolded after West Bengal Chief Minister and TMC leader Mamata Banerjee had in November advocated the need to give due respect to senior members and rejected the notion that elderly leaders should retire from active politics.
Tiwari, who was also the Asansol civic body chief, quit the TMC on Thursday, following in the footsteps of the party's former heavyweight Suvendu Adhikari. Sources close to the leaders indicated that they may join the BJP soon, but things seems to have taken a different turn for Tiwari, as Supriyo and other BJP leaders opposed his entry into the saffron party.
Banerjee, who was speaking to reporters at West Bengal's state secretariat, said that her party's name will remain the All India Trinamool Congress.
He said his supporters were apprehensive that joining TMC would invite the "outside party" to Goa which will split votes.
From putting up a decent performance in the last Lok Sabha polls in Uttar Pradesh winning 10 seats stitching an alliance with arch rival Samajwadi Party, Mayawati-led Bahujan Samaj Party drew a blank in the current general elections, dealing a severe blow to its reputation of representing the voice of Dalits in the state.
Several prominent opposition leaders including Nationalist Congress Party's Sharad Pawar, Bihar Chief Minister and Janata Dal-United leader Nitish Kumar and National Conference leader Farooq Abdullah will share the dais at a rally being organised by Indian National Lok Dal in Haryana's Fatehabad on Sunday.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday received wholehearted support from a group of women from the troubled Sandeshkhali area who met her after a Trinamool Congress rally in Kolkata, party sources said.
Adhikari, a former minister in the cabinet of chief minister Mamata Banerjee, had resigned from the primary membership of the TMC on Thursday.
The special judge of MP/MLA court at Bidhannagar directed that Shah is "required to appear in person/by pleader" at 10 am on that day.
Sandeshkhali Block 2, the epicentre of the violent protests triggered by allegations of land encroachment and sexual misconduct involving local TMC leaders, has contributed the largest share of close to 1,000 complaints.
Bypolls in three assembly constituencies in as many states passed off peacefully on Monday with around over 70 per cent voter turnout, though some technical glitches in electronic voting machine were reported in Tamil Nadu and the ruling Trinamool Congress in West Bengal alleged that the Central Reserve Police Force was "influencing" voters.
Those who quit included deputy chief minister Y JoyKumar Singh.
Should the anti-defection law in India exist only to prevent democratically elected governments from being toppled?
The demonstration was held by the protesting school job aspirants at Camac Street in South Kolkata, where TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee's office is located.
Cricketer Yusuf Pathan will contest from the Baharampur Lok Sabha seat, whereas Kirti Aazd will fight from the Bardhaman-Durgapur constituency.
West Bengal Congress spokesperson Kaustav Bagchi was granted bail by a court in Kolkata on Saturday evening, hours after being arrested for his alleged comments against Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
Supreme Court judge Justice Aniruddha Bose on Tuesday recused himself from hearing appeals of West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and state law minister Moloy Ghatak about their role on the day of arrest of four TMC leaders by the CBI in the Narada sting tape case.
Adhikari had demanded Roy's resignation under the anti-defection law, pointing out that the latter joined the TMC despite winning the assembly polls from the Krishnanagar Uttar assembly constituency on a BJP ticket.
Banerjee, who lost the election in Nandigram, has to win this bypoll to retain the chief minister's post.
Ahead of the 2022 assembly elections, Churchill Alemao 'merged' the NCP with the TMC. The 'merger' took place when Mamata Banerjee was in Mumbai talking to NCP supreme leader Sharad Pawar on how to forge Opposition unity!
The Shiv Sena and Sharad Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party on Wednesday decided to forge a pre-poll alliance for the next month's assembly elections in Goa, saying that the Congress didn't respond to their proposal for a joint contest.
A Sikh Indian Police Service officer, who was deputed at Dhamakhali to prevent senior West Bengal Bharatiya Janata Party leader Suvendu Adhikari from visiting restive Sandeshkhali in North 24 Parganas district, got agitated after a group of activists of the saffron party allegedly hurled the 'Khalistani' jibe at him.
With Thursday's win, the Congress's strength in the Lok Sabha has gone up to 48.
West Bengal minister Jakir Hossain was seriously injured after unidentified attackers hurled a crude bomb at him on Nimtita railway station in Murshidabad district on Wednesday night, police said.
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.
Trinamool Congress on Wednesday suspended party Member of Legislative Assembly Sikha Mitra for violating the party's stand. "I am scared to enter the assembly after Tuesday's violence," Mitra had told media personnel earlier on Wednesday, reacting to the ugly brawl in the legislature on Tuesday.
A number of high-profile electoral battles, starring veterans and debutants, formidable opponents and unlikely contestants, feature in Tuesday's outcome.
What some of our leaders were up to on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Amid the political blame game over Bengal's potato ban, which led to shortages in Jharkhand and Odisha, Uttar Pradesh farmers are the unlikely winners.
The Supreme Court on Friday annulled the Calcutta high court's June 9 order refusing to take on record the reply-affidavits of West Bengal, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and state Law Minister Moloy Ghatak on their role on the day of arrest of four Trinamool Congress leaders on May 17 by the Central Bureau of Investigation in Narada scam case.
