The Trinamool Congress (TMC) has announced names of four of its leaders for the Rajya Sabha election on Sunday.
Two of the four nominees are women, which is a matter of pride on International Women’s Day, noted party’s chairperson and Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
Mamata Banerjee announced the names on Twitter. “I am glad to announce that @AITCofficial will be nominating Arpita Ghosh, Mausam Noor, Dinesh Trivedi and Subrata Bakshi to the Rajya Sabha.”
“As a part of my constant endeavour towards woman empowerment, I am proud that half of our nominations are women,” Ms. Banerjee noted.
Two of the nominated MPs are former Lok Sabha members of the party Dinesh Trivedi from Barrackpore and Arpita Ghosh from Balurghat constituency.
Mr. Trivedi was elected from Barrackpore twice in 2009 and 2014, while Ms. Ghosh, a theatre activist, was elected from Balurghat in 2014.
Another TMC nominee, Mausam Benazir Noor, was a Congress MP from Malda in 2014 but joined the TMC before the 2019 Lok Sabha poll. She was defeated by BJP’s candidate Khagen Murmu, formerly with the CPI (M) in 2019.
The surprise pick was Subrata Bakshi, party’s key organisation man after Mukul Roy left to join the BJP. Mr. Bakshi is the party’s general secretary.
