Trinamool Rebel Gets Opposition Role, Asks Mamata Banerjee To Be 'Adviser'

The split in the Trinamool Congress apparently passed the point of no return today as Bengal assembly Speaker Rathindra Bose approved the party's rebel leader Ritabrata Banerjee as the Leader of the Opposition. Even the keys of the room allotted to the Opposition at the state assembly was handed over to him.  

That the party has been collapsing like a deck of cards in less than a month of its defeat in the state election, became evident as minutes later, Firhad Hakim - a key aide of Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee -- stepped down from the post of the Kolkata Mayor. 

Earlier in the day, Trinamool had dissolved all its committees and frontal organisations with "immediate effect" saying it needed to introspect. 

To make it clear the new order has definitely arrived, Ritabrata Banerjee -- who was expelled from Trinamool Congress earlier this week -- allotted a new role to the Trinamool chief.  

"We would request Mamata Banerjee to be our chief advisor to this opposition front," he said -- in a stark reminder of the time the NCP had split under the leadership of Ajit Pawar but its leaders underscored their allegiance to Sharad Pawar verbally. 

The new Leader of the Opposition also made the role of Abhishek Banerjee clear - that he had none. 

"Abhishek Banerjee has no connection to the formation of the 18th Assembly of West Bengal," he said. 

Earlier today, Banerjee had arrived at the state assembly claiming he has the support of 59 of the party's 80 MLAs. The letter claimed this was the "real" Trinamool Congress and curiously, claimed Mamata Banerjee was the leader of the faction. 

So far, the events appeared to follow the script in Maharashtra - the massive political upheaval that started with the split if Uddhav Thackeray's Shiv Sena and ended with the split in Sharad Pawar's NCP. 

The Trinamool is claiming that the whole split has been engineered by the BJP. "Everyone knows what is happening," the Trinamool's Manav Jaiswal told NDTV. 

The implosion in the party came over the post of the Leader of the Opposition in the state assembly. Mamata Banerjee had named party veteran Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay as the Leader of Opposition. 

But Ritabrata Banerjee - who had joined Trinamool after a stint with the CPM --  being and his close aide Sandipan Saha claimed that the letter supporting Chattopadhyay as the Leader of Opposition in the Bengal assembly carried forged signatures. That issue is now being probed by the state's Criminal Investigation Department. 

The signs have been there since the election defeat - one after the other, leaders have turned against their party, criticising it over multiple issues including corruption and handling of the RG Kar rape-murder case. Many of these leaders had attended a meeting by Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikary last week.