Kolkata, March 24 The internal disciplinary committee of the Trinamool Congress legislative party in West Bengal will meet on Monday to discipline the MLAs who were reluctant to attend the House during the recently concluded second phase of the budget session despite the issuing of a whip.
Party insiders said the meeting is to be chaired by the state Parliamentary Affairs Minister Sovandeb Chattopadhyay and will be conducted by the chief whip of the party’s legislative team in the state Assembly, Nirmal Ghosh.
It is learned that the whip was issued on behalf of the party’s chief whip for all legislators to be present on the floor of the House on the last two days of the budget session on March 19 and March 20.
However, over 50 legislators not only remained absent from the House on March 20, but most of them did not specify any reason to the chief whip to justify their absence.
Party insiders said that this ignoring of the whip has ignited the party leadership and they decided to convene the meeting of the disciplinary and seek explanations from the erring legislators on what prompted them to ignore the whip.
“Based on the explanations presented by the legislators concerned, the disciplinary committee will take decisions accordingly. While some, especially, the first-time offenders, might be relieved by issuing a note of caution for the future, some will be severely reprimanded and in the rarest of rare occasions disciplinary action might be recommended against a couple of them,” said a party legislator and a member of the state cabinet who refused to be named.
Last week the maverick party MLA from the Bharatpur Assembly constituency in Murshidabad district had to face the disciplinary committee for his alleged objectionable comments made about the Leader of the Opposition in the House, Suvendu Adhikari.
However, instead of recommending any disciplinary action against him, he was just cautioned to be careful and refrain from making any such comment in the future.
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