There is one surprise in the dramatic characters of L’affaire Trinamool, 61-year-old Andhra Pradesh MP CM Ramesh. What is a Telugu-speaking MP who converted to the BJP doing, luring TMC MPs towards the saffron party? While Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari and Union Minister Bhupendra Yadav are officially in charge of this entire operation, political tycoon Ramesh is the one who made most of the calls.
Accepting that he played a role in the defection, he told HT: “My skill is to convince (people), all I need is a few hours and I will convince anyone to join (BJP).” He goes on to add that he has known most of the Trinamool MPs for a long time, and since they met in the Parliament canteen, the association has developed over the past few years. This bond is certainly true. When his son married in 2020, lawmakers from across party lines flocked to weddings in Dubai and Hyderabad. Shatabdi Roy, a staunch Mamata Banerjee loyalist at the time – and now a rebel – also attended the wedding celebrations.
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Mamata loyalists and critics of the rebellion pointed out that the 22 MPs (19 in Lok Sabha, 3 in Rajya Sabha) were persuaded to join by promising two things. Firstly, their constituency will be taken care of by the Center so that they do not have dissatisfied voters. Secondly, they will not only be left alone by investigating agencies such as the emergency department, but also by the local police and CID. In return, they will only have to sign on the dotted line. Ramesh denies having any money. “It’s not about the money, there’s no mail, and it’s not commercial.”
A TMC member and Mamata loyalist insisted that Ramesh was not the driving force behind the rebellion he had shown.
“Ramesh is a friend of mine; I love CM,” MP Mahua Moitra said of TMC, “He likes to be politically relevant. Some of us are politically relevant by being at the grassroots. Some of us are politically relevant by having good networks. CM Ramesh always likes to be relevant. CM Ramesh loves to prove his relevance to the BJP. So his relevance to the BJP is, ‘Oh my God, there is a cake being baked.’ Let me at least go ahead and put the raisins in there. Suddenly, this is a Bengali cake being baked, and he’s not the baker and he doesn’t have the supplies, but he suddenly decides, I have a raisin or two that I want to put in the picture. So everyone gets in.”
However, it is important to note that Ramesh had staged a similar walkout with the TDP in 2019. Just as the TMC’s walkout was caused by Mamata’s loss of power, in 2019, Ramesh’s then president Chandrababu Naidu lost power to Jagan Reddy. Then, as now, within a month, four of the six MPs quit the TDP and joined the BJP. Ramesh, like Kakoli Ghosh and some other TMC MPs, was on the radar of law enforcement agencies before joining the BJP. What insiders found strange was that instead of throwing out the anti-defection playbook and complaining to the Speaker, party president Chandrababu Naidu remained silent. Naturally, he will become an alliance partner of the BJP by the time of the next elections.
Recently, Ramesh also participated in the Constitution Club elections where the fight was between Rajiv Pratap Rudy and Sanjeev Balian, as the latter was said to be supported by Home Minister Amit Shah. This is where he first teamed up with BJP’s Nishikant Dubey, the Jharkhand MP, who is also said to be involved in the Trinamool operation. “We know that CM Ramesh was in touch with three TMC MPs at that time,” a TMC Rajya Sabha MP said on condition of anonymity.
It was certainly Prime Minister Adhikari who pushed reluctant MPs like Sayoni Ghosh to sign; Many of them insisted on a personal meeting with him before agreeing. It was during a dinner party at Shatabdi Roy’s house on June 8, the same day the India bloc partners met in Delhi.
