NEW DELHI: Amid infighting in the Trinamool Congress (TMC), West Bengal BJP leader Rahul Sinha on Sunday accused TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee of reducing her party’s elected representatives to “mere servants.”Sinha referred to TMC rebel faction leader Ritabrata Banerjee’s claim that, after the party’s electoral defeat, its MLAs were asked to stand and applaud national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee, Mamata Banerjee’s nephew, during a review meeting.Speaking to ANI in East Bardhaman, Sinha said, “Mamata Banerjee treated all the TMC MLAs and MPs like mere servants… After the election defeat, a meeting was held where it was decreed that everyone must stand up to welcome Abhishek Banerjee when he entered and stand up again when he left. Leaders with self-respect who had suppressed their dignity for so long just to cling to power found themselves asking: what is left to do now that power is gone? So, they all left...”Following Trinamool’s defeat in the April Assembly elections, which ended its 15-year stint in government in West Bengal, the party split into factions led by Mamata Banerjee and Ritabrata Banerjee. The rebel camp claims the support of more than 60 of the TMC’s newly elected MLAs.In the Lok Sabha, 20 of the TMC’s 28 MPs merged with the little-known Nationalist Citizens’ Party of India and extended support to the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government at the Centre. The BJP now governs West Bengal as well.Meanwhile, in a major setback for the TMC, its West Bengal unit president and former minister Chandrima Bhattacharya resigned from all party posts on Saturday, barely a month after taking charge as the state chief.In her resignation letter to Mamata Banerjee, Bhattacharya announced that she was stepping down as state president, a post she was appointed to in June.She also relinquished her role as the authorised signatory for the party’s bank accounts and as Mamata Banerjee’s authorised representative before the Election Commission of India.(With ANI inputs)
