After losing national party status, TMC exploring legal options to challenge EC decision
Kolkata, (PTI): After losing the national party status, the Trinamool Congress is exploring legal options to challenge the decision of the Election Commission, a party source said.
The EC withdrew the national party status of the TMC, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and the Communist Party of India (CPI) on Monday.
"The party is exploring legal options to challenge this decision by EC," a TMC source said on Monday.
The Mamata Banerjee-led party did not issue any official reaction.
The opposition BJP mocked the TMC following the development.
"TMC lost the national party status & will be recognised as a regional party. Didi's aspiration to grow TMC find no place as people know TMC runs a most corrupt, full of appeasement & terror govt. Govt's fall is also certain as people of WB will not tolerate this govt for long," BJP state president Sukanta Majumdar said in a tweet.
In an order issued on Monday, the EC said that NCP and TMC will be recognised as state parties in Nagaland and Meghalaya respectively, based on their performance in the recently concluded assembly elections.
The TMC was formed on January 1, 1998, after West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee left the Congress to form her own political party.
After two unsuccessful attempts in 2001 and 2006, the party came to power by defeating the Left Front in 2011, riding the crest of massive public outrage against the communists.
The party, in recent years, has tried to expand its footprint across the country to pose a direct challenge to the BJP in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. However, the efforts did not bear much fruit.
The BJP, Congress, CPI(M), Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), National People's Party (NPP) and the AAP are now national parties.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Another North Goa nightclub sealed; Kejriwal says corruption led to fire tragedy
Panaji (PTI): As part of a crackdown against tourist establishments violating laws and safety norms in the aftermath of the Arpora fire tragedy, Goa authorities on Saturday sealed a renowned club at Vagator and revoked the fire department NOC of another club.
Cafe CO2 Goa, located on a cliff overlooking the Arabian Sea at Vagator beach in North Goa, was sealed. The move came two days after Goya Club, also in Vagator, was shut down for alleged violations of rules.
Elsewhere, campaigning for local body polls, AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal said the fire incident at Birch by Romeo Lane nightclub at Arpora, which claimed 25 lives on December 6, happened because the BJP government in the state was corrupt.
An inspection of Cafe CO2 Goa by a state government-appointed team revealed that the establishment, with a seating capacity of 250, did not possess a no-objection certificate (NOC) of the Fire and Emergency Services Department. The club, which sits atop Ozrant Cliff, also did not have structural stability, the team found.
The Fire and Emergency Services on Saturday also revoked the NOC issued to Diaz Pool Club and Bar at Anjuna as the fire extinguishers installed in the establishment were found to be inadequate, said divisional fire officer Shripad Gawas.
A notice was issued to Nitin Wadhwa, the partner of the club, he said in the order.
Campaigning at Chimbel village near Panaji in support of his party's Zilla Panchayat election candidate, Aam Aadmi Party leader Kejriwal said the nightclub fire at Arpora happened because of the "corruption of the Pramod Sawant-led state government."
"Why this fire incident happened? I read in the newspapers that the nightclub had no occupancy certificate, no building licence, no excise licence, no construction licence or trade licence. The entire club was illegal but still it was going on," he said.
"How could it go on? Couldn't Pramod Sawant or anyone else see it? I was told that hafta (bribe) was being paid," the former Delhi chief minister said.
A person can not work without bribing officials in the coastal state, Kejriwal said, alleging that officers, MLAs and even ministers are accepting bribes.
