The alleged “house arrest” of poll consultant Prashant Kishor’s I-PAC team members in a hotel by the BJP-led Tripura government only reflects its fear of losing the next Assembly elections, a three-member Trinamul delegation said in Agartala on Wednesday.

The Trinamul delegation that reached Agartala on Wednesday morning, to assess the political situation, comprised Bengal ministers Moloy Ghatak and Bratya Basu and former MP Ritabrata Banerjee.

“The I-PAC members only came to conduct a survey. They had Covid-19 (negative) test reports but still were detained and FIRs were filed against them. This only reflected the fear of the ruling BJP of losing the next election,” Basu said.

Seventeen I-PAC members had reached Agartala on July 17 and five on July 20. Tripura government sources said all the 22 I-PAC members had tested negative and they now to free to move around. They were tested for Covid-19 on Sunday night and were told to stay put in their hotel rooms till test results came in.

Tripura government officials also denied detaining the I-PAC members or filing any FIR against them.

Trinamul, which does not have any MLA in the 60-member Tripura assembly, is trying to create a space for itself by exploiting the “anti-incumbency” factor against the ruling BJP-IPFT combine, which had comprehensively won the 2018 Assembly polls to end the Left Front’s 25-year reign.

Former MP Banerjee said Bengal chief minister and Trinamul chief Mamata Banerjee would be the “face of the Opposition political parties” under whose leadership the BJP would be dethroned both in Tripura and Delhi.“The BJP will lose Tripura in 2023 and the country in 2024 by united political forces,” Banerjee said.

The delegation also said they would name a state committee for Tripura and Trinamul national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee would visit the state soon.