A coup against Anit Thapa, the chief executive of the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration (GTA) and the president of the Bharatiya Gorkha Prajatantrik Morcha (BGPM), was attempted days after the party lost the three hill seats to the BJP in the Assembly elections, multiple sources told The Telegraph.

The sources said an elected GTA Sabha member of the BGPM from the Darjeeling subdivision had started mobilising support in his favour after the party had been defeated in the Darjeeling, Kalimpong and Kurseong seats and, more importantly, its ally Trinamool Congress had lost Bengal to the BJP after 15 years in power.

“Meetings were also held. However, the coup was nipped in the bud as one of the elected GTA Sabha members who attended the meeting went to Anit Thapa and spilled the beans on the plot,” said a source.

Thapa immediately started mobilising his supporters and attending offices at Lal Khoti, which is the GTA headquarters.

On May 18, Thapa called his elected GTA Sabha members to Lal Khoti for a meeting.

The GTA Sabha member who had initiated the coup plan was, however, absent from the meeting.

The Telegraph, which had received a whiff of the development, had called the GTA Sabha member concerned to enquire about his absence a few days later.

“I am down with a cold and fever. Anit is aware that I am sick,” the GTA Sabha member had said.

The GTA consists of 45 elected members, of whom seven are in the Opposition. The rest are with Thapa.

Thapa and Binay Tamang, who were once leaders of the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha, had rebelled against their party president, Bimal Gurung, to snatch power in the Darjeeling hills in 2017.

However, in 2021, Thapa and his supporters ousted Tamang and formed the BGPM.

Observers said the Trinamool government had supported Thapa and Tamang to oust Gurung in 2017. “Again in 2021, the state government supported Thapa to oust Tamang. However, during this latest coup attempt, there was no such support for the said GTA Sabha member from the state,” said a source.

The sources said that the coup attempt episode was over in the BGPM.

“None of the GTA Sabha members supported him,” Thapa told The Telegraph on Wednesday.

This is not to say, however, that BGPM leaders are not resigning from the party.

Many gram panchayat members have resigned from the BGPM and have joined the BJP.

Thapa, however, continues to enjoy a majority in the GTA, whose tenure expires next year.