RSP councillor Nibedita Sharma joins Trinamool

Kolkata: Nibedita Sharma, RSP councillor of ward 65 in the Kolkata Municipal Corporation, joined Trinamool Congress on Saturday. The TMC party flag was handed over to her by party secretary general Partha Chatterjee, in presence of senior Trinamool Congress leaders Subrata Mukherjee, Subrata Bakshi, Firhad Hakim and Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay at the party meeting of the Kolkata South constituency at Nazrul Manch.

"I am inspired by the social development schemes of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and her strong protest against divisive politics," Sharma said. Her husband Sushil Sharma, who had earlier been the Member, Mayor-in-Council (Lighting) of KMC during the Left Front board, also joined TMC.

Senior TMC leader and state Power minister Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay said: "Bengal has produced a Speaker of the Lok Sabha and also a President of India. Now we want a Prime Minister from Bengal (in the form of Mamata Banerjee) so we should take the Lok sabha elections as a challenge and ensure that there is a lead in all wards of KMC."

State Panchayat & Rural Development minister Subrata Mukherjee called for competition among the MLAs and councillors so that TMC leads in all the wards.

Taking the cue from Mukherjee, Mayor Firhad Hakim said all TMC councillors in KMC should have a healthy competition of how much lead they can provide to the candidates of Kolkata South and Kolkata North, from their respective wards. "After the Lok Sabha, there will be the municipal elections, so it will be giving us a better idea of how far we have been successful in reaching our voters," he added.

TMC councillor Jui Biswas proposed that since there is a good number of Hindi speaking voters in the Kolkata South constituency, there should be someone who is well versed in the language at the campaign team of the party.