BJP leader Tathagata Roy bids farewell to Bengal BJP ‘for the time being’
When asked to clarify as to what he meant by saying “For the time being, bye West Bengal BJP,” Roy refused to elaborate
Veteran Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and former governor of Meghalaya and Tripura, Tathagata Roy, who has been attacking a section of top BJP leaders ever since the party’s debacle in the recent West Bengal assembly polls, tweeted on Saturday that he was bidding farewell to the party’s unit in the state ‘for the time being’.
“I was not tweeting to earn applause from anyone. I was just trying to caution the party against the way some in leadership positions had indulged in money and women. Now the results are showing it. I will wait for the results of the civic polls. For the time being bye West Bengal BJP,” Roy tweeted in the morning.
When asked to clarify as to what he meant by saying “For the time being, bye West Bengal BJP,” Roy refused to elaborate.
“I have nothing to say beyond what I have tweeted,” he said.
Senior BJP leaders refused to comment. HT contacted at least three senior BJP leaders in the state.
“We are not giving any comment,” said Samik Bhattacharya, BJP’s spokesperson in the state.
The ruling Trinamool Congress, however, took a jibe at the BJP saying that more (BJP leaders) would quit the party.
“More would quit the party. Those who are knowledgeable know that the party would neither be able to do any good for Bengal nor for the country. Their aspirations won’t be fulfilled till the time they stick to BJP. Nothing can be achieved by spreading communal hatred and through muscle power. You have to bow down before the people to work for them. That’s not the attitude of BJP,” said Firhad Hakim, state minister and senior Trinamool Congress leader.
The BJP had suffered a massive blow in the recently held West Bengal elections when the TMC returned to power for the third consecutive time after a thumping victory winning 213 seats out of the 292 seats where elections were held. The BJP, which had aimed to win more than 200 seats and form the new government, could manage only 77 seats.
Ever since the BJP’s debacle in the recently held West Bengal assembly elections, Roy mounted attacks on some senior leaders including Dilip Ghosh, Kailash Vijayvargiya, Arvind Menon and Shiv Prakash. Ghosh could not be contacted for his comments.
Last month, Roy had told reporters that he was ashamed of some top-level leaders as, ahead of the Bengal assembly polls, they were swayed by the glamour factor while inducting people into the BJP and did not take experience and chances of winning into consideration. Recently, Roy retweeted a tweet by a party worker in which the latter said that he was ashamed of a senior party leader for how he was praising a Tollywood actor.
Earlier this month BJP’s national vice president Dilip Ghosh lashed out at Roy, asking him to leave if he was upset with the party’s style of functioning.
Amid the ongoing feud with Ghosh, Roy had tweeted that he was not mulling quitting the party voluntarily. He had also said that he intends to remain as the party’s “conscience-keeper” and said he would have revealed many more “secrets” if he was quitting the party, in what appeared to be a tongue-in-cheek remark.