Kolkata, July 11 (IANS) The rebel faction in Trinamool Congress under the leadership of the expelled party legislator, Ritabrata Banerjee will be announcing its state and district committees in West Bengal on Saturday.

This rebel faction in the Trinamool Congress, which is claiming to be the “real Trinamool Congress,” had last month announced its new national working committee nominating veteran party legislator Arup Roy as the national spokesperson instead of former West Bengal Chief Minister, Mamata Banerjee.

Now, on Saturday, this faction will announce the names of the office bearers of its state and district committees in West Bengal.

Political observers say that this new move to announce the state and district committees is a calculative move and yet another step to establish its rights on the party’s name and electoral symbol and subsequently on the party funds.

“Already, the rebel faction had claimed rights over the party’s name and symbol to the Election Commission of India by virtue of their supremacy in numbers in the West Bengal Assembly. Now, by announcing its own national working committee last month and its state and district committees subsequently on Saturday, this faction will surely make a forceful argument in support of its claim to the Commission henceforth,” he said.

Officially, there are 80 Trinamool Congress legislators in the West Bengal Assembly now and out of them officially 60 are in the rebel camp, and only 20 are in the “original but minority” camp led by Mamata Banerjee and her nephew, Abhishek Banerjee.

Already a two-day conference of the national working committee of the “rebel but majority” faction had started from Friday and it will conclude later on Saturday with the announcement of the names of office bearers of its state and district committees.

The entire political development on this issue is surfacing when the original faction in the Trinamool Congress led by Mamata Banerjee and Abhishek Banerjee is facing a tough time in meeting the daily expenses of the party considering that debit restrictions have been imposed on as many as 15 bank accounts involving a total deposit of around Rs 1,000 crore and with the Enforcement Directorate (ED) having started an investigation in the money laundering angle in about three of the 15 bank accounts.

Financial transactions worth over Rs 150 crore from these three bank accounts crore are being specially examined by the ED officials.

–IANS

src/rad