Kurmi-backed Independent candidate joins TMC in Purulia

MP | 6 Aug 2023 | Kolkata: Trinamool Congress (TMC) is learnt to have taken control of a Gram Panchayat in the Jungalmahal district of Purulia after an Independent candidate backed by the Kurmi community joined the party. 

The development is said to have taken place at the Simla-Dhanara Gram Panchayat under the Kashipur Assembly constituency. The person, Nitu Mahato who won as an Independent candidate in the recently concluded rural elections with the backing of the Kurmi community, switched to TMC on Saturday. Along with him, 10 more families are learnt to have also joined the party. 

The TMC district president Soumen Beltharia handed over the party flags to these defectors. Also present at the event was the party’s Zilla Parishad member Swapan Beltharia. Speaking on the development, the district president is learnt to have said that the Panchayats in the district which still have a shadow of uncertainty looming above them, will be under TMC’s control before the Panchayat boards are formed. 

He thinks that the ones joining TMC are only doing so because they want to work for development. However, all is not well after the Kurmi-backed Independent candidate switched camps to TMC as this move has apparently irked the Kurmi tribal community there who have threatened to carry out protest rallies in the district. 

Similarly, in Pururlia’s Joypur block, two Independent winning candidates who were backed by the Kurmis also joined TMC in Uparkahon Gram Panchayat, it was learnt. This has further enraged the Kurmi community. Kurmi leader Ajit Prasad Mahato alleged that these candidates were lured to TMC. 

He said that how the TMC is poaching the Kurmi-backed winning candidates makes it clear how much respect the ruling party has for the community. He said that the entire community will be launching full-scale protests in every village. 

“It is clear that without these winning candidates, the ruling party is not being able to form boards,” he remarked. 

The defector Nitu Mahato, however, clarified that he joined TMC because it occurred to him that he won’t be able to work for the development of people in the capacity of an Independent candidate. 

https://www.millenniumpost.in/bengal/kurmi-backed-independent-candidate-joins-tmc-in-purulia-528370