Screengrab from video posted by TMC

NEW DELHI: Trinamool Congress (TMC) supremo Mamata Banerjee on Saturday challenged leaders of the rebel faction to “directly join the BJP” and “take on me if you have the courage,” accusing the saffron party of using them to fuel dissent within the TMC ranks.“I dare the treacherous and ungrateful traitors abandoning the party to directly join the BJP and take me on if you have the courage, instead of playing this dishonest BJP-sponsored game,” Banerjee said in a video message.Questioning the timing of the rebellion, she asked, “You call yourself rebels? Where was your rebellion before the elections? Where was your dissent during the last 15 years when you were MPs and MLAs on TMC tickets and served as ministers and held other important government positions? Why didn’t you come to me then and voice your differences?”Describing TMC workers who remain loyal to the party as its “goldmine,” Banerjee told the rebels not to commit “the same treachery” against the people who had voted for them.Banerjee’s remarks came on a day when another long-time associate, Chandrima Bhattacharya, resigned from the Trinamool Congress and joined the dissident camp. Bhattacharya had been appointed president of the TMC’s West Bengal unit just a month earlier, on June 3.Responding to the development, she announced that, in addition to serving as the TMC’s national chairperson, she would also assume charge as the party’s West Bengal unit chief until veteran leader Subrata Bakshi recovered.The former CM also named Kunal Ghosh and Madan Mitra as the party’s general secretaries.(With PTI inputs)