Month After Modi's Warning to Mamata, 51 TMC Leaders Join BJP; Vijayvargiya Says 'Defections to Continue in 7 Phases'

New Delhi: In a major jolt to Mamata Banerjee, Mukul Roy's son Subhrangshu along with two Bengal legislators and 50 Trinamool Congress councillors joined the Bharatiya Janata Party on Tuesday.

Addressing a press conference, Mukul Roy and BJP's Bengal in-charge Kailash Vijayvargiya said that Bijpur TMC MLA Subhrangshu Roy, Bishnupur Congress MLA Tushar Kanti Bhattacharya and CPI(M) MLA from Hemtabad Debendranath Roy joined the saffron party along with 50 councillors.

Vijayvargiya reminded reporters of the warning PM Modi had given to the Trinamool Congress chief ahead of Lok Sabha elections. He added that more TMC members will soon the BJP in "seven phases".

The prime minister had warned Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee that her MLAs will abandon her after the results of the general elections come and said 40 of them were already in touch with him. "When the lotus will bloom all over Bengal after May 23, Didi (Banerjee), you will see that your MLAs will also abandon you and run away. Forty of your MLAs are in touch with me even today," Modi told an election rally in Hooghly district.

The Trinamool Congress had suspended Bijpur legislator Subhrangshu Roy for six years for anti-party comments, following which he along TMC MLAs Shilbhadra Dutta and Sunil Singh left for Delhi on Monday.

"Now, I will breath freely. Many in the TMC feel suffocated," Roy had said after getting suspended. He had claimed that several others from the party will "follow his footsteps".

According to News18 Bangla, eight councillors from Bhatpara segment had joined the BJP, while 16 members had resigned from Kanchrapara.

At an earlier press conference, Subhrangshu had said he did not get due respect in the TMC. "Now, I only want peace in Bengal," the two-time MLA from Bijpur assembly constituency, which is part of the Barrackpore Lok Sabha seat, said.

He hailed his father's organisational skills and said he had tried to give a lead to his party from his assembly segment, but failed to do so as his father was a better organisational player than him.

Mukul Roy, once considered to be the second-in-command of the Trinamool Congress, joined the BJP in November 2017 after a fallout with party supremo Mamata Banerjee. He is being credited for the stellar show of the BJP in Bengal in the just-concluded Lok Sabha elections.