Sudip Bandopadhyay and Kakoli Ghosh Meet Lok Sabha Speaker Amid Party Transition

On Tuesday, Sudip Bandopadhyay and Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, who recently left the Trinamool Congress to join the Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI), met with Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla. The discussion focused on the seating arrangements for the party's 20 MPs in the lower house. They also addressed the allocation of party offices, including the new parliament building. This meeting took place ahead of the monsoon session of Parliament and during the process of granting parliamentary recognition to NCPI as an ally of the BJP-led NDA.

A source revealed that Bandopadhyay had recently met with Home Minister Amit Shah. It is anticipated that the party will formally notify the Speaker's office regarding its parliamentary recognition. Additionally, the leaders are expected to participate in an all-party meeting on July 19.

This meeting with the Speaker is significant as the Trinamool Congress has filed petitions to disqualify the 20 MPs who have defected to NCPI. Abhishek Banerjee, a leader from TMC, had previously met with Birla and submitted 20 separate petitions to disqualify the rebel MPs under the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution. Mamata Banerjee argued that these MPs voluntarily resigned from TMC by joining another party, thus justifying their disqualification. She also urged the Speaker not to grant any recognition, status, or privileges to any faction claiming to be a separate group. However, sources indicated that the issue of disqualification petitions was not raised during the recent meeting with the Speaker.

Previously, Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar had written to Speaker Om Birla requesting the removal of Kalyan Banerjee, a close associate of Mamata Banerjee. She accused Banerjee of using abusive language in the lower house premises, making derogatory comments towards women, and exhibiting inappropriate behavior. This letter was written following a complaint against the Shrirampur MP on May 28. The request for Banerjee's removal came amid ongoing internal strife within the party, where a lawyer criticized the rebel MPs and challenged them to contest elections on BJP tickets if they had the courage. However, Banerjee dismissed Ghosh Dastidar's allegations as false, fabricated, and later concocted.