NDA’s candidate for the Presidential poll, Droupadi Murmu, is scheduled to visit Kolkata on Saturday and meet BJP MPs and MLAs from West Bengal to seek their support for the July 18 election. Murmu is visiting various states to seek support from legislators. On Friday, she was in Lucknow to meet BJP legislators of Uttar Pradesh. According to the BJP, she will arrive in Kolkata around 10 am on Saturday. "She will meet BJP lawmakers at a hotel in the New Town area. We have got this information as of now," said a senior BJP leader. It is not clear whether Murmu will visit the state Assembly or meet Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee to seek her support. Assembly Speaker Biman Banerjee also told reporters that he has no information about any plan of Murmu visiting the Assembly. The Opposition parties, including the Congress and TMC, have named former Union minister Yashwant Sinha as their joint nominee in the Presidential election. At present, BJP has 17 Lok Sabha MPs from West Bengal. However, Barrackpore MP Arjun Singh has switched over to the TMC, and is yet to resign from Lok Sabha. In the state Assembly, the party has 75 MLAs but five of them have switched over to the TMC and are yet to give up their Assembly membership. Meanwhile, BJP state president Sukanta Majumdar and Leader of Opposition in the Assembly Suvendu Adhikari wrote a letter to all TMC MLAs and MPs, seeking their support for Murmu. Reacting to the letter from the BJP leaders, TMC MP Sougata Roy said, "TMC MPs and MLAs will vote for Yashwant Sinha. There is no direction from the party to vote for Droupadi Murmu.”
