The Khela Is Still On

West Bengal

- Romita Datta

Last week, BJP leaders were rejoicing over news that the Congress’s Jitin Prasada was joining their ranks, seemingly oblivious of a similar crisis unfolding in their own party in West Bengal, where national vice-president Mukul Roy was returning to the Trinamool Congress (TMC), with son Subhrangshu in tow. Learning about the move barely hours before Roy & Co. were to meet TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee and her nephew Abhishek on June 11, top BJP leaders tried in vain to forestall the reverse migration, rubbing salt into wounds inflicted by a humiliating election defeat in the state just over a month ago.

Roy joined the BJP in November 2017 but was never really at home. It’s unlikely that his growing discomfort would have gone unnoticed in the party. He was hemmed in by unfriendly colleagues and unable to shake off the cloud of suspicion owing to his decades-long association with Mamata. At one point, he had been Didi’s most trusted man and the TMC second-in-command, till irreconcilable differences cropped up over the rise of Abhishek in the party.