4 min readNew DelhiJun 14, 2026 08:27 PM IST
First published on: Jun 14, 2026 at 06:51 PM IST
As a group of rebel Trinamool Congress leaders met at a Union minister’s Delhi home on Sunday, two TMC MPs still in Mamata Banerjee’s camp reached Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla’s residence and submitted a letter from party general secretary Abhishek Banerjee, requesting him to treat the TMC as a single party represented only by its authorised leader and whip and to refuse recognition to any purported breakaway faction of the party.
Abhishek, who is also a Lok Sabha member, wrote in the letter that he had learnt that “certain members of the Lok Sabha belonging to the AITC have submitted, or propose to submit, a communication to your good office seeking to be recognised as a separate group or faction of the AITC, independent of the legislative party”.
“The AITC is a single, indivisible political party. The legislative party in the Lok Sabha derives its very existence from, and remains an emanation of, the political party. There is in law only one AITC, one Leader of the Party in the House, and one Whip, all of whom hold office by authority of the political party and its competent organisational authority,” read the letter, which, as per TMC MPs, was sent to Birla on Wednesday but was handed over on Sunday by Sagarika Ghose and Kirti Azad.
The letter said that no member or set of members can carve out a parallel “group” or “faction” of the party on their own and claim independent recognition within the House.
“This position is squarely settled by the judgment of the Constitution Bench of the Hon’ble Supreme Court in Subhash Desai v. Principal Secretary, Governor of Maharashtra & Ors., 2023 INSC 516 (AIR 2023 SC 2406), decided on 11 May 2023 in Writ Petition (Civil) No. 493 of 2022 and connected matters, authored for the Bench presided over by the Hon’ble Chief Justice of India,” read the letter.
“The defence of a ‘split’ stands abrogated. The Hon’ble Court held that the omission of Paragraph 3 of the Tenth Schedule by the Constitution (Ninety-first Amendment) Act, 2003 has the effect that the defence of a “split” is no longer available to members facing proceedings under the Tenth Schedule. The law, therefore, does not recognise the splintering of a political party into competing groups as a permissible event; it treats such conduct, instead, through the lens of disqualification,” read Banerjee’s letter.
Banerjee argued that the political party and not the legislative party is supreme. “The Speaker recognises the political party, not rival factions. The Hon’ble Court held that where two or more factions claim to be the political party, the Speaker is to determine, prima facie, who the political party is for the purpose of adjudicating disqualification petitions under Paragraph 2(1) of the Tenth Schedule. The framework thus contemplates ascertainment of the one true political party not the conferral of independent recognition upon a faction,” he wrote.
Banerjee said that even if— without admitting it—two‑thirds of the legislative party had switched sides, there was no merger with another party nor any creation of a new party called the All India Trinamool Congress (AITC).
“The framers of the Constitution have intentionally identified two separate terms – political party and legislature party. The Constitution as well as the judgment stipulate that both conditions stated above have to be conjointly satisfied,” read the letter.
Banerjee argued, “Any voluntary act by which a member or members hold themselves out as a separate party/faction, repudiate the authority of the Party’s Leader and Whip, or function independently of the political party, would attract disqualification under Paragraph 2(1)(a) of the Tenth Schedule as a voluntary giving up of membership of the political party, and under Paragraph 2(1)(b) in the event of voting or abstention contrary to the Party Whip.”
Requesting the Speaker to give an opportunity to the TMC to be heard before a decision is made, Banerjee wrote, “Treat the AITC as a single political party represented in the House solely through its duly authorised Leader and Whip, and decline to accord any recognition, status, or facility to any purported separate group or faction of the AITC.”
Abhishek Banerjee wrote in the letter that he has come to know that “certain members of the Lok Sabha belonging to the AITC have submitted, or propose to submit, a communication to your office seeking to be recognised as a separate group or faction of the AITC” (File Photo) 
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