Trinamool Congress was unrepresented at the swearing-in ceremony of Narendra Modi and others in the Union cabinet on Sunday evening as instructed by Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee.
Trinamool’s leader in the Lok Sabha, Sudip Bandyopadhyay, said the way the third BJP-led NDA government at the Centre was formed, despite Prime Minister Modi’s party falling substantially short of the majority mark of 272, made it impossible for Team Mamata to attend the swearing-in and convey its good wishes.
“This government was formed in fully undemocratic, unconstitutional and illegitimate ways. That is why we cannot wish it well. We are instead preparing for the fight to ensure the good of the nation and its people,” said the Kolkata Uttar MP, now in Delhi.
This time, Trinamool has 29 MPs.
Bandyopadhyay confirmed that the Trinamool parliamentary party received a formal invitation for the swearing-in.
Trinamool Rajya Sabha member Sagarika Ghose, in a statement on X, jeered at the ceremony.
“Swearing in or yet empty performance? In his own constituency Varanasi @narendramodi’s winning majority has come down by more than 3 lakh votes. ‘400 paar’ was a hot air balloon,” she wrote.
“Hindutva has flopped and @BJP4India has lost in Faizabad - Ayodhya and across the Ayodhya region. Modi’s brazen heat speech in Banswara routed the BJP in the area,” she added. “Shamelessly, the narcissistic costumed actor still swears himself in.”
Sources in the Trinamool parliamentary party said irrespective of what others in INDIA — especially the Congress — does, both Mamata and the party’s Number Two Abhishek Banerjee were against being seen at the Raisina Hills event.
Mamata, in a meeting with her parliamentary party on Saturday, made it clear that she believes the collapse of this NDA government is only a matter of time.
“The new government will ultimately be of the INDIA (bloc).... However, let us see how many days they (NDA) stay. Let’s see how they (the BJP) are satisfying whom and how. Though we respect those in the NDA (apart from the BJP), their constituents have many demands. However, our constituents in the INDIA bloc have no demand apart from the welfare of the people,” she had told journalists afterwards.
As part of the third-largest force in the INDIA space after the Congress and the SP, the chief minister advised her MPs against sitting idle in Delhi, and said simply because the bloc had not staked its claim just yet did not imply it would not do so in the near future.
Besides the newly
elected 29 Lok Sabha MPs, Trinamool has 13 Rajya Sabha members.
