Twenty All India Trinamool Congress MPs have plunged the party into its sharpest parliamentary crisis in years by telling Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla that they have merged with the Nationalist Citizens Party of India and will support the National Democratic Alliance.
The move, announced on Sunday by Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar after the rebel group met Birla in New Delhi, threatens to cut Trinamool’s Lok Sabha strength to single digits and gives the NDA a potential boost before the next session of Parliament. The rebels have sought separate seating as an NCPI bloc and said they would work with the ruling alliance under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s leadership.
The claim remains subject to the Speaker’s decision and could be tested in court. Trinamool’s leadership moved quickly to block recognition of the breakaway group, arguing that elected members cannot by themselves create a rival parliamentary identity or dilute the authority of the party’s authorised leader and whip. Abhishek Banerjee wrote to Birla urging him not to extend status, facilities or recognition to any faction claiming separation from the party.
The rebellion marks a severe challenge to Mamata Banerjee’s command over a party she founded in 1998 after breaking from the Congress. Trinamool has dominated West Bengal politics for more than a decade, but its parliamentary position now faces a challenge from within. The rebel bloc has framed the move as a lawful merger under the anti-defection framework, while the party establishment calls it an act of betrayal by MPs elected on the Trinamool symbol.
Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, the Barasat MP and one of the most prominent faces of the revolt, said the group had crossed the two-thirds threshold required to claim protection from disqualification. The Tenth Schedule permits a merger when not less than two-thirds of members of a legislature party agree to it, but disputes over whether the original political party must also merge have become central to modern defection battles.
Sudip Bandyopadhyay, another veteran associated with the rebel group, has indicated that the NCPI route may be an interim step rather than the final political destination. The rebels have suggested they may seek to claim the Trinamool identity once Parliament reconvenes, setting up a contest over who represents the party in the House. That prospect mirrors wider churn in party politics, where legislature-party numbers, formal party control and symbol disputes increasingly converge before presiding officers, courts and the Election Commission.
NCPI, until now a marginal outfit, has been pushed abruptly into national attention. Led by Shiuli Kundu, the party has operated in Assam and Tripura and is listed among registered unrecognised parties. It contested the 2023 Tripura Assembly polls without securing a meaningful vote base, with its candidates losing deposits in the seats where it formally fought. Its symbol has been described as a pen nib with seven rays, a low-profile marker now attached to a possible bloc of 20 MPs.
The shift would alter opposition arithmetic in the Lok Sabha if recognised. Trinamool has been one of the larger non-BJP formations in the House and a significant component of anti-NDA floor strategy, even when relations with the Congress have been strained. A depleted Trinamool would weaken opposition coordination on bills, debates and procedural motions, while the NDA would gain additional comfort beyond its existing majority.
Parliament’s coming session is expected to see hard-fought exchanges over federal relations, welfare funding, investigations by central agencies, electoral rules and national security. A Trinamool split of this scale would allow the ruling alliance to press more aggressively and could influence committee assignments, speaking time and opposition responses to major bills.
