A panchayat member of the BJP and her husband have gone missing for the past five days after she and some others had expressed no-confidence against the chief of a panchayat in South Dinajpur.

The disappearance of Dipali Mardi, 42, and Lukash Mardi, 47, since August 5 made the saffron camp accuse Trinamul of abducting them. Trinamul leaders, however, have brushed aside the charges.

Sources said Danga village panchayat of Balurghat block has 20 seats. In the 2018 panchayat polls, the BJP had won 11 seats, Trinamul six seats and the Left got the remaining three seats. The BJP had formed the board then.

However, recently, the pradhan, Mallika Karmakar Sutradhar, who was an elected member of the BJP, defected to Trinamul.

This made the other BJP members express no-confidence against her. They approached the administration and it was decided that the meeting where the motion would be tabled will be held on August 13.

“Trinamul however, played politics and on August 5, they abducted Dipali Mardi, one of our members, and her husband Lukash Tudu. It was nothing but an attempt to stall the no-confidence motion. We also suspect that in this way, Trinamul is trying to get some more members from our side so that the pradhan (Karmakar Sutradhar), who did a turncoat, continues to remain in her post,” said Subhash Sarkar, a BJP leader and also a member of the panchayat.

On Monday night, Dipali’s mother filed a missing diary with Balurghat police. Investigations have started to trace the couple, police said.

District Trinamul leaders, however, have denied the charges.

“We are not in so much of a crisis that we have to abduct a panchayat member of the BJP. There must be some other reason for such sudden disappearance of the couple. The BJP is simply trying to play politics,” said Gautam Das, the district Trinamul chief of South Dinajpur.

TMC worker stabbed

Jalpaiguri: A Trinamul booth president was stabbed allegedly by the son of a BJP worker in Tarapara of Jalpaiguri’s Sadar block on Monday night.

Police said Bappa Das, son of Naresh Das who is the booth president of the BJP in the same locality, stabbed Sujit Roy during a brawl. Roy is under treatment at the NBMCH.

The police have arrested Bappa and Naresh.