1. 3 MLAs & 50 TMC Councillors Swell BJP Ranks
The defection of three Bengal MLAs and around 50 civic councillors to BJP on Tuesday, less than a week after the party’s stunning Lok Sabha gains in the state, signalled a reversal of an eight-year trend seen in Bengal politics.
One MLA each from Trinamool, Congress and CPM switched over to BJP in the presence of the latter’s central leadership in New Delhi, reversing the oneway traffic of defectors to the Trinamool from all parties since it came to office in Bengal in 2011. The three MLAs were joined by around 50 councillors — all from Trinamool Congress which effectively handed over control of four North 24 Paraganas municipalities (Naihati, Kanchrapara, Halishahar and Bhatpara) to BJP.
(Source: The Times Of India)
2. Mukul’s Mole Claim Adds to Trinamool Jitters
Tuesday’s defection spectacle intensified jitters in the Trinamool Congress over who might go next, as BJP leader Mukul Roy kept his former party guessing and claimed that moles had been planted to break Trinamool from within.
Roy, the former No 2 in Trinamool, said at the New Delhi programme where the converts were paraded: “It was, all along, our plan to keep people in Trinamool for as long as necessary, to make them work for the BJP from within. Now the time has come to bring some of them out, step by step,” he said.
“There is no rush to reveal all the names at one go and expose them,” Roy added.
(Source: The Telegraph)
3. Trivedi’s 2015 Clip Goes Viral, Fuels Switchover Talk
A video clip showing former Trinamool Congress MP Dinesh Trivedi lauding central schemes like ‘Make in India’ and ‘Swachh Bharat Abhiyan’ in a television interview has gone viral over the last two days.
With his leader and Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee going hammer and tongs at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the clip has sparked speculation about Trivedi joining the saffron camp.
A careful look at the clip shows Trivedi wearing an overcoat, which is unusual considering the searing end-May heat. “I have also seen it. It’s an old video recording that has been cleverly uploaded now. I gave this interview four years ago in 2015, a year after Narendra Modi came to power in 2014 for the first time,” Trivedi said ahead of TMC’s review meeting on 31 May.
(Source: The Times Of India)
4. Mamata Shuffle Rewards Poll Performers
Chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday made a surprise cabinet reshuffle amid murmurs it was meant to reward Trinamul leaders who had helped the party put up a good show in the Lok Sabha polls in the face of a BJP surge across Bengal.
“As no new minister is being introduced, there is no need for an oath-taking,” said a senior official.
Ministers Suvendu Adhikari, Bratya Basu, Soumen Mahapatra and Rajib Banerjee have been assigned additional portfolios. Two cabinet members, Binoy Burman and Santiram Mahato, have been stripped off their departments but retained as ministers without portfolio.
(Source: The Telegraph)
5. More Bengal IPS Officers Shifted
The Mamata Banerjee government on Tuesday transferred 43 IPS officers amid murmurs that the reshuffle — one of the biggest in recent times in Bengal — was aimed at streamlining police administration after the poor show of the Trinamul Congress in the Lok Sabha polls.
Nishat Pervez, who had been made Bidhannagar police commissioner on Monday, was sent back to his earlier post of deputy inspector general of police (CID-operations) on Tuesday.
B.L. Meena is the new Bidhananagar commissioner. He was posted as the Siliguri police commissioner.
(Source: The Telegraph)
6. Saradha Case: CBI Quizzes SIT Officer
The CBI on Tuesday quizzed a key officer of the Special Investigation Team (SIT) that probed the Saradha Ponzi scam and sent summons to two others, including senior IPS officer Arnab Ghosh, even as it sought legal opinion on former Kolkata police commissioner Rajeev Kumar.
Kumar, who had on Monday sought a week-long reprieve from appearing before CBI citing “personal work”, didn’t file any bail petition either in the Barasat special court or the Calcutta High Court’s vacation bench.
According to CBI sources, the central investigating agency questioned inspector Prabhakar Nath, who was Kumar’s subordinate in the SIT, and sent summons to former cop Dilip Hazra and asked Ghosh, promoted as CID’s special superintendent on Tuesday, to appear before it on Wednesday morning.
(Source: The Times Of India)
7. Post-Poll Clashes Rock Cooch Behar, Nadia
With post-election violence continuing across Bengal on Tuesday, Maruganj in Cooch Behar’s Toofanganj witnessed a skirmish between residents, many of them BJP supporters, and police. Locals alleged that police resorted to a lathicharge to disperse a crowd shouting slogans at state minister and Trinamool district president Rabindranath Ghosh.
Ghosh stopped his convoy, got off and was allegedly heard ordering police to lathicharge those shouting slogans. He was travelling from Cooch Behar town to Krishnapur, also in Toofanganj, along NH-31 when the incident happened.
The crowd allegedly attacked cops and damaged a police vehicle. Several BJP supporters and other locals were injured.
(Source: The Times Of India)
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