No takers for Mukul Roy in Bengal? Mamata Banerjee says he is ‘BJP MLA’, Suvendu Adhikari calls him ‘rejected leader’ | India News

NEW DELHI: Mukul Roy, the once powerful politician of West Bengal, who has flip-flopped between the TMC and the BJP in the last few years, seems to have no takers today.
Mukul Roy, who was once the closest aide of Mamata Banerjee, left the Trinamool Congress in 2017 to join the BJP. He became an MLA on BJP ticket in 2021, but after the results were out he returned to the Trinamool fold. However, he did not resign as an MLA.

(June 2021 file picture of Mukul Roy rejoining TMC in the presence of Mamata Banerjee)
The former railway minister, who did a disappearing act on Monday night and was spotted in Delhi a day later, now wants to return to the saffron fold.
“I am a BJP legislator. I want to be with the BJP. The party has made arrangements for my stay here. I want to meet Amit Shah and speak to (party president) J P Nadda,” he told a Bengali news channel late on Tuesday evening.
“I was not keeping well for quite some time, so I was away from politics. But right now, I am fine and would again be active in politics,” Roy said and added “I am 100 per cent confident that I would never be associated with the TMC”.
But the Bengal BJP chief Suvendu Adhikari says Mukul Roy is not welcome. Adhikari called Roy a “rejected leader” and said the BJP does not need him.
“Those who left the BJP after May 2021 when the party workers were being “tortured” in the state, cannot be a BJP man,” Adhikari said.
On the other hand, Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee, when asked about Mukul Roy’s latest moves, said “Mukul Roy is BJP’s MLA, it’s his affair if he wants to go to Delhi.”
Meanwhile, Mukul Roy’s family, which had filed a missing complaint on Monday night, has accused the BJP of playing politics with an “unwell” leader who is not in the “right frame of mind.”
Roy has been suffering from dementia and Parkinson’s disease, according to his doctors and his son Subhrangshu. He also underwent a neurological operation of the brain last month.
“My father is not in the right frame of mind. I would request everyone not to do politics with an unwell person. After he went missing, I had also filed a police complaint last night,” Subhrangshu told reporters.
Eminent Neurosurgeon Dr S N Singh, who has been treating the Bengal politician for quite some time, told PTI: “Mr Roy’s (physical) health has improved a lot compared to what it was a month back. He is physically fit to travel, but how much he has regained his mental functioning is yet to be ascertained … dementia can never be totally reversed and there is always a chance it may get worse with age.”
But Mukul Roy dismisses all these concerns and accuses people of spreading rumours.
“I am absolutely fit and fine. Some people are spreading rumours that I am unwell, but this is not true. I am a BJP MLA and have come here to be with the party. I want to work for my party BJP. I was never mentally with the TMC after I left it,” the 69-year-old politician said to news agency PTI.
When asked about his post-2021 stint with the TMC, Roy said, “I was not well at that point of time and was never mentally part of it.”
(With inputs from agencies)