TMC leader Sushmita Dev resigns as Rajya Sabha MP, exits party
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New Delhi: Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader Sushmita Dev on Wednesday resigned as a Rajya Sabha member and quit the party, citing personal and political reasons behind her decision.
While declining to elaborate on the circumstances that led to her exit, Dev said that people have the right to change their minds.
“What prompted me to take this decision is a very long story,” she told reporters. “And in politics, I don’t think that everything needs to be revealed. But I feel that I don’t want to be in a situation where I am in two boats.”
Her resignation came shortly after she met Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma in New Delhi. Dev, however, described the meeting as a “courtesy visit”.
Dev first entered the Rajya Sabha as a TMC representative in 2021 and served until 2023. She returned to the Upper House in April 2024 after being re-elected.
She had joined the TMC in 2021 after resigning from the Congress. Prior to that, she served as an MLA in Assam from 2011 to 2014 and represented the Silchar constituency in the Lok Sabha from 2014 to 2019.
Her resignation comes just two days after another TMC Rajya Sabha MP, Sukhendu Sekhar Ray, stepped down from the Upper House and quit the party. Ray cited the party’s defeat to the BJP in the recent West Bengal Assembly elections as the reason for his decision.
The developments have added to the growing turbulence within the TMC following its electoral setback in West Bengal. Expelled MLA Ritabrata Banerjee has claimed that a group of 58 out of the party’s 80 legislators has been recognised as the TMC legislature wing in the Assembly.
The move is being viewed as a direct challenge to TMC chief Mamata Banerjee, who has backed Sovandeb Chattopadhyay as the Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly.
Amid the internal unrest, the TMC on June 3 dissolved all its committees and organisational units across West Bengal, announcing a “comprehensive” review of the party’s performance and organisational structure following the Assembly election defeat.
