Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday set a seven-day deadline for the “greedy and corrupt” in the Trinamul Congress to leave for the BJP, which she accused of “gathering garbage”.
The Trinamul Congress chief, who held a meeting here with the party’s councillors at municipalities across Bengal, said she was planning to undertake a thorough cleansing of the organisation by replacing “traitors” with dedicated workers.
“We are discarding garbage and the BJP is gathering it. I would like to request the traitors who remain undecided on leaving or staying: please leave within seven days. For every one such person, we will get 500 more. We will restructure our party by replacing the greedy and corrupt with dedicated workers,” Mamata said at the meeting at Nazrul Manch.
Hours after her message, Trinamul’s Bongaon North MLA Biswajit Das joined the BJP in New Delhi. A dozen Trinamul councillors at the Bongaon municipality and 15 panchayat functionaries in the area also switched to the BJP.
After the Lok Sabha poll results were out on May 23, four Trinamul MLAs, over 100 councillors and numerous panchayat functionaries joined the BJP.
“Whenever one is caught doing something illegal nowadays, that person changes the party. But I am warning everyone that none will be let go if caught doing anything illegal. People are changing political colours at the drop of a hat. But remember, doing politics means serving the people, something I have always done,” said Mamata.
“If you want to stay with us, remember the party has nothing to lose if a few councillors join some other outfit. But those who desert the party will not be taken back, except in certain special cases where people have left because of some misunderstandings.”
“Do not worry. All of you will win again. We don’t sell off our party,” said Mamata.
The chief minister said the Trinamul leadership had made mistakes in the treatment of loyalists and promised corrective action in future. Without naming the likes of turncoats Arjun Singh, his brother-in-law Sunil Singh, Mukul Roy and his son Subhranshu Roy, Mamata said mistakes were made out of “love”.
“In the Noapara Assembly (bypoll), we should have given the ticket to the wife (Manju Basu) of our leader Bikash Basu, slain in the CPM era. Instead, we gave it to someone’s relative out of love. We shouldn’t have,” she said.
Noapara MLA Sunil Singh defected to the BJP on Monday, along with a majority of Trinamul councillors at Garulia municipality.
“The father used to work for the party, so the son was also given a ticket. Package deal. They left, bag and baggage, together. These were mistakes,” Mamata said. Her reference apparently was to Bijpur MLA Subhranshu Roy.
Mamata repeatedly issued warnings against corrupt practices — such as taking commissions from beneficiaries of government schemes — reminding them that they were under public scrutiny.
“Work hard and honestly to reach out to the masses. Don’t fall into the BJP’s trap. People are looking at us. One who does good work never loses elections,” she said.
“The party will not tolerate leaders taking money from the people in exchange of giving government benefits. If you have taken any, return it immediately. In our party, such corruption will not be tolerated. Everything will be investigated and action initiated, irrespective of political affiliations,” she added.
