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Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal on Sunday demanded the disqualification of rebel Trinamool Congress (TMC) MPs who have announced plans to merge with the Nationalist Citizens Party (NCP), arguing that legislators cannot unilaterally merge with another political party under the law. His remarks came amid an escalating rebellion within the TMC, after dissident Lok Sabha members sought recognition as a separate group and declared support for the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA).In a post on X, Sibal criticised the move by the rebel MPs and questioned the legality of their proposed merger.“TMC rebels: Will merge with Nationalist Citizens Party (NCP). Indian democracy has become the ‘theatre of the absurd’. A joke! The rebels of the TMC legislative party cannot merge with a political party; that can happen only if the TMC wished to do so!” he said.Calling for action against the dissidents, Sibal added: “Disqualify them!”The comments came shortly after rebel TMC MP Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar and other dissident lawmakers met Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla in New Delhi and sought a separate seating arrangement in the House.Addressing reporters after the meeting, Dastidar claimed that more than two-thirds of the party’s Lok Sabha MPs had backed the move.“Two-thirds of the TMC MPs have given a letter to the speaker for a separate seating arrangement. We will merge with the Nationalist Citizens Party and support the NDA,” she said.Earlier in the day, Dastidar had said that 20 MPs elected on the All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) ticket had met the Speaker and informed him of their decision to break away from the party.“We, the twenty MPs elected from the AITC, met the Speaker and submitted a letter requesting to sit separately; these twenty MPs constitute more than two-thirds of our total strength. We are merging with the Nationalist Citizens Party. Moving forward, we will work for the nation and collaborate with the NDA under the leadership of the Prime Minister,” she said.The development prompted a strong response from the TMC leadership. Earlier, party national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee wrote to Speaker Birla, urging him not to recognise any separate faction within the party.In his letter, Banerjee argued that the TMC remained a single political entity and that no group of MPs could independently claim a separate identity in Parliament.“The AITC is a single, indivisible political party. The legislative party in the Lok Sabha derives its very existence from, and remains an emanation of, the political party. There is in law only one AITC, one Leader of the Party in the House, and one Whip, all of whom hold office by authority of the political party and its competent organisational authority. No member or set of members can, by their own volition, carve out a parallel ‘group’ or ‘faction’ of the same party and claim independent recognition within the House,” Banerjee said.
