AGARTALA: A day after Tripura chief minister Biplab Kumar Deb returned home from a weeklong visit to New Delhi, the Indigenous People’s Front of Tripura (IPFT), an ally of the ruling BJP in the state, was summoned on Thursday to the national capital by Union home minister Amit Shah.
Speculations are rife in the state about a possible cabinet expansion with a change of guard in the government and in the party too.
A three-member delegation of the IPFT led by its general secretary and state tribal welfare minister Mevar Kr Jamatia left the state in the morning to hold discussions with Shah on Thursday. Although the IPFT claimed that the invitation was a delayed response from Shah over a request a month ago by the party to discuss their contentious issues related to development of the tribal community, BJP leaders considered the move significant to eliminate any threat to the BJP government in the Assembly.
BJP sources indicated that after royal scion Pradyot Kishore Debbarman’s Tipra Motha won the ADC, the IPFT has lost its ground is facing a threat to its existence. In the first session of the ADC, the Tipra Motha passed the Greater Tipraland Bill and sent it to the state government for its assent in the Assembly. In the meantime, IPFT MLA Brishaketu Debbarma resigned and joined Tipra Motha, which has deepened the crisis in the IPFT.
With the resignation of Brishaketu, the strength of IPFT in the Assembly has been reduced to seven. Several others could also join Tipra Motha, which could threaten the BJP government as a large number of MLAs are opposing Deb’s leadership. A senior BJP leader said, “We are trying to bring at least two or three IPFT MLAs into our fold before it merges with Tipra Motha like the INPT.”
In the ADC election, INPT was an ally of Tripra Motha and merged with it a month later. The INPT, which was formed dissolving the TUJS, has no existence in state politics now.
IPFT spokesperson Mangal Debbarma said MLA Prashanta Debbarma and the party’s assistant general secretary Jiten Debbarma besides Mevar would hold discussions on their core demand of creation of Tipraland based on the Sixth Schedule in order to protect the identity of the indigenous people of the state.
Apart from that, the IPFT has been waiting for the recommendation of a high-powered modality committee constituted by the home ministry for socio-economic, cultural and linguistic development of the tribals in accordance with the pre-poll agreement of the BJP and IPFT before 2018 Assembly elections.
