TMC urges Lok Sabha Speaker to disqualify 20 'rebel' MPs

The Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress (TMC) has formally requested Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla to disqualify 20 of its Members of Parliament who have revolted against the party's leadership.

TMC general secretary and Lok Sabha leader Abhishek Banerjee submitted 20 separate petitions to the Speaker, arguing for the disqualification of the MPs. The rebels have reportedly sought recognition as a separate bloc in the Lok Sabha and announced their intention to merge with the Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI), a registered but unrecognized political party based in Howrah, West Bengal.

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Twenty people met the speaker and claimed they should be treated as a separate group. Later, we got to know those MPs claimed to have joined another party, NCPI; nobody has heard the name of this group. Even they had not heard the name of this party.

Banerjee met with the Speaker after the 20 rebel TMC MPs had also met him to convey their decision to form a separate bloc. The TMC leader, accompanied by fellow MPs Saugata Roy, Kalyan Banerjee, Mahua Moitra, and Rajya Sabha member Derek O'Brien, asserted that the rebel MPs' claims of a merger are invalid. He emphasized that, according to constitutional law, a merger requires two-thirds of the entire party to join another party, not just individual legislators.

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So if (they) have been elected on a symbol and (are) claiming after two years that they are joining a new party, their membership should go.

"Twenty people met the speaker and claimed they should be treated as a separate group. Later, we got to know those MPs claimed to have joined another party, NCPI; nobody has heard the name of this group. Even they had not heard the name of this party," Banerjee stated. He cited the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution, which mandates disqualification if a member voluntarily gives up their party membership. "So if (they) have been elected on a symbol and (are) claiming after two years that they are joining a new party, their membership should go," he added.

Banerjee further clarified that the rule regarding two-thirds party merger applies to the entire party, not just the legislative party. "Based on that, I, as the leader of Lok Sabha of TMC, have submitted 20 different disqualification petitions against those MPs," he said. He concluded that leaving the party membership and an invalid merger are sufficient grounds for disqualification from the House.

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If you have left your membership of the party, which many of you have spoken of, and this merger is invalid, both are enough to disqualify you from the membership of the House.