Ahead of the 2018 assembly elections in Tripura, six Congress MLAs join Trinamool Cngress

GUWAHATI: Ahead of the 2018 assembly elections in the Left Front–ruled Tripura, the Trinamool Congress has made its debut with six rebel Congress MLAs joining the party.

The MLAs submitted their decision to change parties to Speaker Legislative Ramendra Chandra Debnath. However, only four of the six MLAs — Sudip Roy Barman, Asish Kumar Saha, Biswa Bandhu Sen and Diba Chandra Hwrhankal were present.

The other two-Pranjit Sigha Roy and Dilip Sarkar, were not present and were not even seen at the meeting of the MLAs with Trinamool national vice-president Mukul Roy, who was in Agartala on Tuesday. Pradesh Congress president Birajit Sinha had expelled Congress MLA Biswa Bandhu Sen for six years on grounds of anti-party activities.

On Monday, Congress legislator Jitendra Sarkar resigned from Tripura Assembly and decided to rejoin the ruling CPM. Sarkar, a former speaker of the Tripura assembly joined the Congress in 2010. In the 60-member assembly, the Congress had 10 MLAs.