Trouble in TMC-Ruled Kharagpur Municipality: TMC tells Kharagpur civic body chief to resign

According to Maity, 20 of the party’s 25 councillors at Kharagpur Municipality have threatened to bring a no-confidence motion against Sarkar, alleging corruption charges against the chairman of the civic body.

“The civic body has been witnessing a crisis for some time. Seeing that, the party has taken the decision and asked Pradeep Sarkar to resign from the post of the chairman. The directive has come from our national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee. The party will utilise Sarkar in other work. He has been informed about the decision of the party,” Maity told mediapersons.

Sarkar, who is yet to resign, said: “I am out of Kharagpur right now. I will tender my resignation tomorrow (Tuesday) after going to the municipality. The party gave me the opportunity to become the chairman of the civic board. I will abide by the decision of the party.”

Sarkar was made chairman of the civic body in April this year after the party’s win in the civic body election. He has been chairman of the civic board since 2015. He had also won Kharagpur Assembly bypoll in 2019. However, he lost the seat in 2021 to BJP’s Hiran Chattopadhyay.

For the last few months, TMC councillors have been accusing Sarkar of being involved in financial irregularities and working without taking party councillors in confidence.

About 20 councillors had written a letter to Ajit Maity against Sarkar.

Notably, Abhishek Banerjee is seen taking an active role in taking strong measures against party leaders facing corruption charges. Last week, Abhishek Banerjee, considered number two in the party, asked a gram panchayat pradhan in Nadia district to resign from his post after learning that he has not been working for the people. After getting the directive, the panchayat pradhan tendered his resignation.