TMC's Muslim MLA joins BJP, many more 'in queue'

TMC MLA Monirul Islam became the third legislator to desert the ruling party in West Bengal after the reverses in the Lok Sabha polls

Days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi vowed to win the trust of minorities and “puncture” the veil of fear woven around those communities, four more Trinamool Congress (TMC) leaders, including the party’s sitting MLA Munir-ul-Rehman, joined the BJP on Wednesday.

Some more Muslim leaders of the TMC are in queue to join the saffron party, sources said.

Besides Rehman, former TMC MLA Gadadhar Hazra, party’s Birbhum district youth wing general secretary Mohd Asif Iqbal and TMC worker Nimai Das joined the BJP here in the presence Kailash Vijayvargiya, the party’s West Bengal in-charge.

Mukul Roy, former TMC leader and a key aide of Mamata Banerjee who had joined the BJP two years ago, is said to have steered the defections.

West Bengal has over 30% Muslim votes and Rehman’s joining the BJP is seen as an attempt by the saffron party to win the confidence of the community and further consolidate its position in the state where Assembly polls are due to be held in 2021.

“Voice is rising from within the minority community in West Bengal. And they (Muslims) are voluntarily joining the BJP, reposing faith in our ‘Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas, Sabka Vishwas’ slogan,” Mukul Roy told reporters.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said that minorities have been misled and kept under a spectre of fear through wrong propaganda which needed to be countered.

Vijayvargiya said TMC leaders and workers were coming out “in large numbers” to join the BJP as they felt “suffocated” in their party due to Mamata Banerjee’s “arrogance” and “reign of terror”.