Goa verdict 2022: TMC's rout 'won't affect' Luizinho Faleiro

Shubhadeep Choudhury
New Delhi, March 10

Trinamool Congress (TMC) sources on Thursday ruled out party supremo Mamata Banerjee securing former Goa Chief Minister Luizinho Faleiro’s resignation from the Rajya Sabha in the wake of the rout faced by the TMC candidates in the Assembly elections in Goa.

Banerjee got incumbent MP Arpita Ghosh to resign from the Rajya Sabha in September last year to pave the way for Faleiro to get elected to the Rajya Sabha in the vacancy created there following her exit. Faleiro, who resigned from the Congress to join the TMC, was rewarded by Banerjee with the hope that his presence would strengthen the TMC in the coastal state.

However, Faleiro later refused to contest in the Goa Assembly elections despite his name featuring in the first list of candidates released by the TMC. A section of TMC leaders is of the view that like Arpita Ghosh, Fareliro’s term in the Rajya Sabha should also be cut short and former Union Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha sent in his place. Former BJP leader Sinha joined TMC in March last year and was made a vice-president of the party.

TMC sources, however, say that dumping of Faleiro by Banerjee at this juncture appears unlikely. The sources point out that former Mahila Congress president Sushmita Dev, whose father late Santosh Mohan Dev had two stints in the Lok Sabha from Tripura, was sent to the Rajya Sabha from West Bengal to help the TMC make inroads in Tripura. Dev has not been asked to quit the Rajya Sabha despite TMC badly losing in the civic polls held in Tripura in November last year.