Wishing well for the upcoming WB polls! Swapan Dasgupta resigns as Rajya Sabha MP

Kolkata, March 16: With BJP fielding nominated Rajya Sabha member Swapan Dasgupta in the upcoming West Bengal Assembly elections, Dasgupta has tendered his resignation as a Rajya Sabha MP, sent to the Chairman of the House. While the same is to be accepted, this is probably after TMC MP Mahua Moitra had said he could be disqualified for filing nomination as a BJP candidate under the 10th Schedule of the Constitution.

 

 

BJP has fielded Dasgupta, one of its prominent faces in West Bengal, from the Tarakeshwar Assembly seat in Hoogly district. Constitutional rules say a nominated member of a House "shall be disqualified for being a member of the House if he joins any political party after the expiry of six months from the date on which he takes his seat after complying with the requirements of Article 99 or, as the case may be, Article 188".

 

 

 

 

Reacting to the development, Dasgupta had said that all the outstanding issues would be resolved before nomination process. Last week, Dasgupta had welcomed his nomination from Tarakeshwar seat. "Honoured to be nominated by the West Bengal BJP to contest from Tarakeshwar — a centre of Bengal's cultural heritage. I look forward to the campaign for a new, vibrant Sonar Bangla," he had tweeted.

 

 

Dasgupta was nominated to the Rajya Sabha by the Narendra Modi government in April 2016. Earlier, MPs like Subramanian Swamy, Rakesh Sinha and Sonal Mansingh had listed 'BJP' as their party affiliation. Dasgupta had time till October 2016 to do the same. The last date for filing nomination for the Tarakeshwar seat, which votes in the third phase of Bengal polls, is March 19.

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