TMC claim on Harka

TT, March 6: The Trinamul secretary-general Partha Chatterjee today said Harka Bahadur Chhetri had been declared as the party's candidate in Kalimpong on the basis of his written request.

After Mamata Banerjee had declared on Friday that Chhetri would be the Trinamul candidate in Kalimpong, he said he would contest on the Jan Andalon Party ticket and the announcement was caused by the ruling party's hurriedness.

Today also, Chhetri iterated his stand in Kalimpong.

However, education minister Chatterjee said in Calcutta this evening that Chhetri's name had been included in the candidates' list as he had wanted to contest with the Trinamul symbol. "He had written to us, expressing his wish to contest with our symbol and that is why his name was announced. But, he is free to do as he pleases," Chatterjee said.

Earlier in the day, the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha had asked Chhetri why he was not seeking an apology from Mamata for declaring him as the Trinamul candidate in Kalimpong.

"If there has been a miscommunication (between Harka and the Trinamul leadership) and if his (Chhetri's) name was indeed announced without consulting him, why is he not seeking an apology from Mamata Banerjee?" Roshan Giri, the general secretary of the Morcha, said in a statement issued in Darjeeling. "We think that this was not a miscommunication and Chhetri's name was announced after due consultations."

Citing a report in The Telegraph on March 5, Giri said a senior Trinamul minister had said Chhetri had written to the party for the candidature. "If the report was wrong, why haven't Chhetri and other JAP leaders taken the minister and The Telegraph to court?" asked Giri.

In the March 5 edition, The Telegraph had said: "A Trinamul senior leader, when asked about Chhetri's candidature, today said: "Chhetri had sent a letter to Trinamul agreeing to contest as the party's candidate."