Trinamul vice-president Saugata Roy on Monday said he would not have pursued negotiations with Suvendu Adhikari, the disgruntled party colleague and former minister, had there been no approval from the party, and that there was still scope for dialogue.
Adhikari, on the other hand, made another public appearance at a socio-religious event in Nandigram on Monday, but as on Sunday’s event at Mahishadal, stayed mum on his political future.
Adhikari’s public appearance was for a Raas Utsav event in Nandigram, where he steered clear of making any political statement. Instead, in a brief address, he spoke of the significance of the festival and his attachment to Nandigram and its people.
Adhikari also underlined the importance of the ‘Raas’ ceremony — when Lord Krishna meets his followers on the banks of river Yamuna — and participated in a performance of devotional songs to Krishna. He later tried his hand at playing a traditional percussion instrument.
However, a convoy of over a hundred motorcycles that accompanied his car to the venue was conspicuous in the triangular yellow flags that the bikes brandished.
Each had “Om” written on them in the Devanagari script.
Given the speculation over the possibility of Adhikari leaving Trinamul for the BJP or floating another party that was aligned to the NDA, the visual was deemed significant by many.
Asked about the significance of the flags, Adhikari clarified later that he had nothing to do with them.
“They were handed out by the Raas committee… they are the Raas committee’s, nothing to do with me,” he said.
Last week, the East Midnapore leader and Nandigram MLA stepped down from Mamata’s cabinet, and other important posts, while retaining his membership of the party and the Assembly.
If Adhikari quits the party, Trinamul insiders feel he might carry along with him his loyalists, which has the potential of dealing a big blow to the party before the crucial state elections.
Dum Dum MP Roy, who has been acting as an emissary of a section in the senior leadership of Trinamul in a bid to to retain Adhikari, sought to dispel the perception that he was doing so without the sanction of 30B Harish Chatterjee Street (read chief minister and party supremo Mamata Banerjee).
“When it (the sanction) is no longer there, I will no longer pursue the dialogue,” said the MP.
“Everything I have been doing (with regard to Adhikari) has been with the stamp of approval from the party. Everything I do in the future will also be done with the stamp of approval from the party. I am a part of Trinamul,” he added.
Sources in Trinamul said that Mamata, who plans to hold a “mega” rally in Midnapore — an Adhikari bastion — on December 7, was neither encouraging nor discouraging of the party’s efforts to retain Adhikari.
Two recent meetings between Adhikari — one of Trinamul’s tallest leaders and at the forefront of the Nandigram movement which had catapulted Trinamul’s swift rise to power — and Roy had failed to break the ice.
Adhikari did step down from the state cabinet.
A third meeting was to be held in the past weekend, but Adhikari cited his mother’s ill health and gave Calcutta a miss. He, however, made “apolitical” public appearances in his home district on Sunday and Monday.
“I think politics is inseparable from patience and perseverance. Talks can continue,” said Roy.
Rumours of Adhikari’s discomfort with the party had been doing the rounds for years. But the leader was especially displeased with Trinamul over losing control over six key districts, when the post of party observer was abolished in a major July reshuffle apparently orchestrated by Mamata’s nephew Abhishek Banerjee — Trinamul’s heir-apparent, which Adhikari had hoped to be — and poll strategist Prashant Kishor, whose alleged interference he does not approve of.
