TMC Rebel MPs Seek Four More Weeks For Replying To LS Disqualification Notices

The 20 Lok Sabha MPs who quit the TMC and aligned themselves with the NCPI have sought another four weeks to respond to notices issued by Speaker Om Birla on petitions seeking their disqualification under the anti-defection law, as the deadline granted to them expired on Tuesday.

Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI) parliamentary chairperson Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar said the MPs were yet to collate all documents required for their response and had therefore sought another extension from the Lok Sabha Secretariat.

She said the MPs got a letter from the Lok Sabha Secretariat on August 26 seeking their reply regarding TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee's letter to the Lok Sabha Speaker requesting cancellation of the membership of the 20 NCPI Parliamentarians.

"We had then written to the Lok Sabha Secretariat seeking three weeks to reply, which was granted. Now we need some more time as 20 MPs are yet to collate all the documents. So we have sought four more weeks,” Ghosh Dastidar told PTI.

The TMC’s Mamata Banerjee faction was quick to seize on the extension request.

“Which party they are in now — do they need time to say that? These turncoats, opportunists and ungrateful people make tall claims, conduct Facebook revolutions and win elections on anti-BJP votes only to serve the BJP, but cannot even answer a notice?” TMC leader Kunal Ghosh said in a sharp reaction.

Asked about Ghosh's remarks, Ghosh Dastidar said she did not want to comment.

“It is for the court and the Lok Sabha to decide,” she said.

The latest move comes against the backdrop of renewed speculation over the political destination of the rebel MPs. Last week, rebel MP Jagadish Chandra Barma Basunia had claimed that 17 of the 20 NCPI MPs would join the BJP before or after Durga Puja.

The claim was rejected by fellow dissident MPs, while the BJP also distanced itself from it.

The dispute over the MPs' status began soon after 20 of the TMC's 27 Lok Sabha MPs quit the party in June following its defeat in the West Bengal Assembly elections and joined the NCPI, extending support to the BJP-led NDA.

Lok Sabha records, however, continue to list them as TMC members, while their request for recognition as a separate NCPI parliamentary group remains a matter of contention.

TMC leader Abhishek Banerjee had filed petitions before the Speaker in June seeking their disqualification under the Tenth Schedule.

The proceedings had already entered the judicial arena after the Supreme Court on August 25 agreed to hear Banerjee's plea seeking an expeditious decision by the Speaker on the disqualification petitions.