Not received application from Mukul Roy for party registration: EC official

Speaking to The Indian Express, a top EC official said, “We have not received any application either from Mukul Roy of Trinamool or from any other political leader from West Bengal, seeking any registration for a new political party.” He added that any party, which needs to be registered with the EC, has to apply to the commission’s New Delhi office. It cannot be done by writing to the chief electoral officer of a state.

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Later in the day, Roy — while speaking to mediapersons at Bongaon where a bypoll was in progress — said the news was “absolutely baseless and fictitious and done with malafide intentions”. “I am going to take legal action,” he added.

The report, however, forced many senior TMC leaders to make discreet inquiries. A senior cabinet minister, while terming the report as baseless, claimed he has verified the same. “We too heard the news and checked it with the ECI through our party network. There is no truth in it. Moreover, Mukul Roy too needs to inform the party before applying for the registration for a new party,” said the leader.

Trinamool sources, however, acknowledged that the Saradha probe and CBI summons to Roy have created a distance between him and Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. Ever since November 2013, when reports surfaced that he may be summoned by the CBI in connection with Saradha scam, Mamata had systematically began to downgrade Roy’s prominence in the party.

First, she took away from him the responsibility of several districts and handed over the same to leaders like Subrata Mukherjee, Partha Chatterjee and her nephew Abhishek Banerjee. The party youth wing was also revamped and Roy’s son, Subhrangshu, was downgraded along with several others. Abhishek was brought into focus and given more responsibility.

Subsequently, Roy was removed as the party’s sole spokesperson and Partha Chatterjee — secretary general of TMC — was given the charge. Finally, when the CBI did summon Roy about three weeks ago, though Mamata came out in his support but something was amiss. The old chemistry between Mamata and Roy was missing and a new hierarchical order was evident within the Trinamool.

But party sources said that Roy’s solid networking enabled him to enlist the support of a number of disgruntled MLAs and MPs of Trinamool. The number of such MLAs and MPs vary from 40 to 50 and are spread across several districts. This has often led to the buzz about Roy engineering a split in the Trinamool — a charge Roy has consistently denied saying: “I am the founder general secretary of the TMC. Why should I desert it ?”