Suspended Trinamool Congress MP Mukul Roy is likely to resign from the Rajya Sabha today and will also reveal the reason to leave the party of which he was a founding member.
Roy is slated to meet Vice President Venkaiah Naidu, who is also the Chairman of the Rajya Sabha, at 3.30 p.m. and submit his resignation from the upper house of parliament. He would then hold a media meet at his New Delhi residence.
Sixty-three-year-old Roy was suspended from the TMC for "anti-party activities" on September 25, hours after he had announced that he would resign from the Rajya Sabha and give up the primary membership of the party after Durga Puja.
Amid much speculation that he was eyeing a role in the BJP, Roy has met over the past few days BJP heavyweights including Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and its National General Secretary and West Bengal in charge Kailash Vijayvargiya.
Roy on Tuesday said he had always been "very comfortable" talking to BJP leaders.
"(West Bengal Chief Minister) Mamata Banerjee had instructed me in 2004 to have a meeting with Sangh leaders. I met them in Kolkata. In 2003, Banerjee had herself met (late VHP leader) Ashok Singhal at her residence. So it is not new for me," Roy told reporters.
Asked about his ties with BJP leaders, he said, "I am very comfortable talking to them."
Another theory doing the rounds is that Roy might revive the Nationalist Trinamool Congress or float a new outfit and function as an ally of the BJP by joining the centre's ruling National Democratic Alliance. Poliitcal circles feel Roy might try to rope in some dissident Trinamool leaders to prove his political weight to the BJP.
(With agencies)
