TMC legislators' meet cancelled as most MLAs skip; party says absence due to Abhishek attack fallout

Ghosh communicated twin decisions taken by the party to heighten protests against the Suvendu Adhikari-led BJP government over the next 48 hours.

Kolkata: A scheduled meeting of newly-elected Trinamool Congress (TMC) legislators, which was supposed to be chaired by party supremo Mamata Banerjee, was called off on Sunday after nearly three-fourths of the 80 MLAs failed to turn up, party sources said.

TMC spokesperson Kunal Ghosh attributed the absence of MLAs to the "sudden and emergent ground situation" in the wake of Saturday's attack on TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee and the subsequent alleged assault on party MP Kalyan Banerjee on Sunday.

"The meeting was pre-scheduled. However, in the aftermath of the attacks on our leaders, our MLAs are organising protest programmes at the ground level, following which severe police action has been unleashed on our workers.

"The absentee MLAs, who are stuck with managing the ground situation, assisting our workers who have been arrested, had informed the legislative party of the developments and requested if the meeting could be temporarily postponed," Ghosh told reporters outside former Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's Kalighat residence, where the meeting was scheduled to take place.

Ghosh said that in the wake of that "legitimate request" from legislators, the Trinamool legislative party decided to call off the meeting "for the time being", despite some 20 MLAs having arrived at the venue of the meeting, which was scheduled to start at 3 pm.

"We will hold this meeting at a later date, the details of which will be duly communicated to our MLAs. All our legislators have communicated that they are firmly standing with the party during these difficult times," Ghosh said.

Party sources said that despite the scant presence of leaders, Banerjee held informal talks with those present at the meeting.

Ghosh, however, communicated twin decisions taken by the party to heighten protests against the Suvendu Adhikari-led BJP government over the next 48 hours.

"We have asked our leaders to organise protest rallies at block levels in rural areas and at the municipal wards in the state's urban pockets on Monday, June 1. The rallies will decry the attacks on our leaders Abhishek Banerjee, Kalyan Banerjee and all our workers who are victims of BJP's post-poll terror," Ghosh said.

The TMC's Beleghata MLA also announced the party's day-long sit-in in central Kolkata, which will be led by Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday.

"The one-day symbolic sit-in protest will be held at the Rani Rashmoni Road protest site in Esplanade against the ongoing post-poll violence and the inhumane hawker eviction that are being carried out by means of bulldozers across the state," he said.

The subsequent political programmes of our party will be announced from the dharna platform on June 2, he added.