Kolkata: West Bengal Congress veteran Pradip Bhattacharya claimed on Saturday that his party has still been making "atonement" of expelling Mamata Banerjee from the organisation in 1997. The former Rajya Sabha MP made the assertion a day before the Trinamul Congress supremo turned 70.
“Congress is still making atonement for expelling Mamata from the party. The day the present chief minister of Bengal was expelled, I was returning from Serampore. I was the MP of Serampore then,” Mr Bhattacharya said at an event.
He recalled, “Somen Mitra (the then-state president) called me over the phone when I was near Second Hooghly Bridge. He told me that Sitaram Kesri (the then Congress president) gave the order to expel her and he would have to implement it immediately.”
The former Congress MP added, “I then asked Somen not to expel her at any cost. But there was so much pressure on Somen that he was forced to do it. That threw our party to a gorge. We do not know when and how we would be able to come out of it. We have to be reunited.”
Another Congress veteran Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury however said, “Pradipda is a senior party leader. I will not say against what he said. We have been into politics by fighting atrocities by Mamata. We didn't say ‘No’ to alliance with her in 2011. Congress helped Mamata to come to power. Later all saw her real face.”
