Bengali actor and Rebel TMC MP Rachna Banerjee says she will always have respect for former CM Mamata Banerjee and they share a bond for many years. Rachna was seen speaking to news agency PTI amid a growing rebellion within Trinamool Congress, with a rebel faction of 20 Lok Sabha MPs announcing their intention to merge with the Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI) and continuous resignation from members.
What Rachna said
Rachna said, “There can never be any rebellion against her (Mamata Banerjee). We have shared a very old relationship with Didi, and that relationship will always remain the same. The respect we have for her will always remain. But one thing is true… everyone says that we received votes because of Didi. That is correct. We got votes because of Didi, because Didi herself is the identity and symbol of the Trinamool Congress. In Trinamool Congress, the face people recognise and trust is Didi’s face, and we all respect her deeply. People voted after seeing Didi, and they voted for Rachna Banerjee not because they were impressed by my face, but because they believed I would be able to work for them. Didi was the face behind it, and after that they gave us their votes with the expectation that I would do good work for the people and for my constituency. There was absolutely no resentment. But I felt that if the Central government and the State government were ruled by the same side, then getting work done would become much easier… something we have not really seen over the past 15 years.”
‘We were unable to do the kind of work’
“People want us to do something for them, to carry out good work for them. And to make that happen, support from the Centre is very important. So at times, with due respect to Didi, I felt that while staying with her, there were many instances where obstacles were created in our work, and we were unable to do the kind of work we actually wanted to do,” she added.
Rachna has been hosting the reality game show Didi No.1 for years now. She had Mamata Banerjee as a guest on the show a few years ago, and has spoken about their alliance several times.
There is an ongoing political crisis within the Trinamool Congress, where 58 MLAs under the leadership of expelled MLA Ritabrata Banerjee in West Bengal, and 20 MPs led by Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar in the Lok Sabha have rebelled against the party.
Three Rajya Sabha MPs, including Sukhendu Sekhar Ray, Sushmita Dev and Prakash Baraik, have also resigned from the Upper House and party membership.
