Hummingbird News Desk
KOLKATA, 21 MAY: Shovandeb Chattopadhyay, state agriculture minister today resigned as Bhowanipore MLA and tendered his resignation to the Assembly Speaker Biman Banerjee as a Bhowanipore MLA.
While tendering his resignation to the Speaker Biman Banerjee at his chamber in the state Assembly, Mr Chattopadhyay said, “I’ve been thinking through past few days that Mamata Banerjee should contest from Bhwanipore and I should tender my resignation so that after six months of her tenure at chief minister she can contest from her old seat Bhwanipore.”
Mr Chattopadhyay said, “This time the party did not dictate me or gave me any rulings but I thought for the sake of Bengal, Mamata Banerjee should become chief minister.”
She lost marginally to Suvendu Adhikary in Nandigram but she won the assembly poll and came back with a huge mandate. “This election she won against all odds and I find at this juncture she should contest from Bhowanipore.”
Mamata Banerjee will have to contest within six months from the date of taking oath as chief minister.
Similar thing happened in 2011, when she resigned as a Union railway minister after her party came to power in 2011 with a huge mandate.
After six months she contested from Bhwanipore after the then state transport and PWD minister and Bhowanipore MLA Subrata Bakshi resigned from the post. He later became Lok Sabha MP.
A party insider said that Shovandeb Chattopadhyay may be made a Rajya Sabha MP as Dinesh Tribedi who was made Rajya Sabha MP in 2020 resigned as Trinamul MP in Rajya Sabha in 2021 and joined the BJP.
However, the state agriculture minister is yet to resign from the post of agriculture minister. As per rule he can be a minister for six months without even becoming an MLA.
Party insiders said that chief minister’s agriculture adviser Pradip Majumdar this time won from Durgapur (East) and may be made the state’s agriculture minister.
Earlier, it was thought that Miss Mamata Banerjee may contest from Kardha where Kajal Sinha, the Trinamul candidate and municipality chairman though won the election died of Covid-19 pandemic before the election results were published.
Moreover, Amit Mitra, state finance minister, who could not contest the poll due to his ailment will contest the poll after six months from Kardah.
There are two more by polls in Santipur and Dinhata where two BJP MPs Jagannath Sarkar and Nisith Pramanik contested from Santipur and Dinhata Assembly segments reportedly but decided to remain as MPs.
It is learnt that Shankar Singh who was defeated this time from Ranaghat (North – West) will contest from Santipur and Udayan Guha from Dinhata.
Two more seats in Murshidabad -Samshergunj and Jangipur where election was not held on 29 April due to demise of RSP and Congress candidate in Covid-19 may be held along with these by-polls. The two seats already belonged to Trinamul Congress in 2016 poll where Amirul Islam and Jakir Hossain won from Shamshergunj and Jangipur respectively.
