The Trinamul Congress’s much-hyped plan to stage protests in Delhi next week against the Centre’s pause on the release of funds due to Bengal suffered a setback on Friday when the Eastern Railway refused to provide a special train to the party to ferry 3,000 people to the national capital.

The special train, for which the Trinamul leadership had applied to the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) — a PSU that handles ticketing and other services — and had also made the necessary payments, was to leave Howrah station on Saturday morning.

“The BJP govt shamelessly denied to provide a special train after accepting the deposit. This blatant obstruction of WB’s right to protest for their rightful dues is a glaring testament to their FEAR,” Trinamul’s national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee wrote in his X handle (formerly Twitter) on Friday evening.

This, according to Trinamul leaders, was the second attempt by the Centre to prevent the party from carrying out an agitation demanding the release of central funds, including due MGNREGA wages, and fresh funds under the 100-day job scheme in Delhi.

Initially, Trinamul had plans to take more than 50,000 party workers and MGNREGA job card holders to Delhi and surround Krishi Bhavan in Delhi to demand the release of funds under the 100-day job scheme in the beginning of October.

“But the Delhi police did not grant permission to hold the demonstration in Ram Leela Maidan.

“So, the party had to scale down the programme and decided to take about 3,000 people, including party leaders, workers and some job card holders, to Delhi by hiring a special train and staging a demonstration in Jantar Mantar.... But with the railways refusing to allot the train, the revised plan has hit a hurdle, too,” said Trinamul spokesperson Kunal Ghosh.

Even as the railway’s refusal to grant a rake came as a shock, sources in the party said they were hopeful of carrying out the agitation according to schedule as the top brass of the party was contemplating an alternative plan of hiring Volvo buses to take the protestors to Delhi.

“We will need 50 Volvo buses to carry about 3,000 people to Delhi. A final decision in this regard will be taken by Abhishek,” said a senior party leader.

Sources in Trinamul said the refusal of the train by the railways smacked off a conspiracy as the party had followed all procedures to hire the rake. First, a letter to this effect was sent to the group general manager of IRCTC, Calcutta, on September 23, expressing interest in hiring a train comprising 20 sleeper coaches to Delhi that should leave Howrah station on September 30.

The party, sources said, had deposited a total of Rs 61 lakh, including a security deposit of Rs 11 lakh, for the purpose as instructed by the IRCTC in a return mail.

“This is a conspiracy to derail our programme,” said a Trinamul source.

A railway spokesperson said a formal communication seeking a rake had come via IRCTC. “We did not receive any formal communication directly from any political party,” said Kausik Mitra, the chief public relations officer of Eastern Railway.

“We received a communication from the group general manager of IRCTC for a rake. But that is not available right now,” he added.

A senior official of the IRCTC declined to comment on the issue, but sources in the railways said existing protocol mandated that an application seeking a rake had to be sent to the IRCTC.

“The availability of rakes is subject to the discretion of the Railway Board. However, the application has to be sent to the GGM or IRCTC. An advance amount (a security deposit) needs to be paid. After that, the application is forwarded to the railways,” said a source.

Another official said “The application was denied because of a genuine scarcity of rakes”.

“All the parties involved followed due procedure. The railways communicated to us that the rake was unavailable. We communicated the same to the applicants today. The security deposit will be refunded,” he said.

Earlier in the day, the Trinamul leaders, supporters and some MGNREGA job card holders had started gathering at the Netaji Indoor Stadium where they were put up by the party before boarding the special train scheduled to depart on Saturday morning.

Some job card holders who came to the city said that they were eager to take part in the agitation in Delhi as they did not get their due wages cleared.

Abdul Matin, a MGNREGA job card holder from Murshidabad, said he did not get his wage worth Rs 4,000 cleared by the centre.

“That’s the reason I decided to go to Delhi to join the protest. They (the centre) should know how much we are suffering here,” said Matin.

The Centre has stopped the release of funds under the MGNREGA since November, 2021 citing misappropriation of funds under the scheme. The state claimed that the centre has not cleared a due of Rs 6,500 crore under the MGNREGA which include wages worth Rs 3,000 crore.

Additional reporting by Debraj Mitra