Anupam Hazra, expelled Trinamool Congress MP, joins BJP

Expelled Trinamool Congress MP Anupam Hazra on Tuesday joined the Bharatiya Janata Party in presence of party's general secretary and in-charge of West Bengal affairs Kailash Vijayvargiya and Mukul Roy in the national capital. Besides Hazra, Congress MLA Dulal Chandra Bar and CPM legislator Khagen Murmu also joined the party ahead of forthcoming Lok Sabha Elections. 

Earlier in the day, Hazra wrote on his Facebook - 'A fresh beginning.' 

Reacting to the development, West Bengal BJP chief Dilip Ghosh said that every individual was important for the party. "Hazra was suspended from the Trinamool because he was in touch with the BJP. BJP will be benefitted from this.. more people are likely to join us in the coming days," he said. 

Hazra, the MP from Bolpur, was suspended by Trinamool Congress in January. He was once considered very close to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.

“Time and again Anupam Hazra has done activities that don't match with the ideologies of the party. We have suspended him,” Trinamool Secretary-General Partha Chatterjee had said at that time.

Lok Sabha elections in West Bengal will begin on April 11 and polling would be held over seven phases through May 19, the Election Commission announced on Sunday. The Trinamool Congress, the BJP, the CPI(M)-led Left Front and the Congress will vie for 42 Lok Sabha seats in the state.

As per the News Nation poll survey in West Bengal, Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress (AITC) is projected to get 29 seats whereas the BJP and the Congress are likely to bag 9 and 2 seats respectively. Left Front may get 2 seats in Lok Sabha Elections 2019. As far as the vote share is concerned, the survey shows that the Trinamool Congress is likely to get 36 per cent votes, followed by the BJP (23 per cent), Left Front (23 per cent), and the Congress (10 per cent).