Mukul Roy in BJP, says party will clinch West Bengal

In a setback for TMC, former Railway Minister Mukul Roy — once a key strategist of the party and close confidante of Mamata Banerjee — joined the BJP on Friday, and claimed that his new party will come to power in West Bengal soon.

Roy, who had quit TMC last month, hailed the BJP as "not a communal force" but a "secular force" and asserted that it is his "proud privilege" to be working under Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

He also said that people of West Bengal wanted an alternative to Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, and will vote the saffron party to power in the next polls. "The BJP will soon clinch power in the state," he said.

Roy joined the BJP at its party headquarters here in the presence of Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad and party general secretary in-charge for West Bengal Kailash Vijayvargiya. Prasad called him a "veteran public figure and political leader".

Roy's party was dismissive of the development. West Bengal Power Minister and senior TMC leader Sovandeb Chatterjee said, "Taking out one mug of water from the Sea would not make any difference to the Sea."

Since Roy (63) quit TMC, there were broad indications that he would join the BJP, though there was also a view in the saffron party that instead of making Roy join the party, a better proposition would be to utilise his services from outside against Banerjee's party. The reason for this was corruption cases that Roy was facing.

Roy is an ace organisation man and this seems to have finally led to the decision of making him join the party. In a similar fashion, the BJP had inducted in its fold former Congress leader and master strategist of Assam Himanta Biswa Sarma and reaped rich dividends there. Prasad said that Roy was a founder leader of the TMC who played a key role in its expansion and march to power in the state.

Roy had resigned from the Rajya Sabha and quit TMC in the second week of October after falling out from Banerjee, saying there was "lack of principle" in the party.

His decision is also linked to a growing clout of Banerjee's nephew Abhishek Banerjee in TMC. However, his party had maintained that Roy resigned as he could not withstand the pressure after the CBI went after him.

The party had also suspended him for six years for indulging in anti-party activities.

Sharing the dias with BJP leaders, Roy said that TMC could not have established itself in West Bengal without the BJP and recalled how it had forged an alliance with the BJP soon after Banerjee founded the party and became a minister in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government.

Prasad said that with the induction of the "veteran political leader", the BJP will do great things in West Bengal. He, nevertheless, hastened to add that Roy decided to join the party without any conditions. "His role will be decided," said Vijayvargiya.

Roy's induction will be a shot in the arm for West Bengal BJP leadership and workers, especially given the fact that the state will be going for Panchayat polls soon.

Interestingly, BJP national secretary and then in-charge of Bengal Siddharth Nath Singh had said 'Bhag Mukul Bhag' (run Mukul run) in November 2014 at a rally in Kolkata. Asked about that, the state BJP said that the intention was to make him run out of TMC which had been successful.

Switching sides

• Ex-Rly Minister Mukul Roy was a key strategist and close confidante of Mamata Banerjee
• In Oct, he resigned from RS & quit TMC saying there was ‘lack of principle’ in the party
• He hailed BJP as a “secular force”, said it is his “proud privilege” to be working under PM Modi