Sukhendu Sekhar Ray distances himself from TMC rebel group

Published 10 June 2026 · local

Trinamool Congress (TMC) Chief Whip in the Rajya Sabha, Sukhendu Sekhar Ray, who resigned from the Upper House on Monday (June 8, 2026), praised his

Trinamool Congress (TMC) Chief Whip in the Rajya Sabha, Sukhendu Sekhar Ray, who resigned from the Upper House on Monday (June 8, 2026), praised his colleagues in the Lok Sabha and the West Bengal Assembly on Tuesday (June 9, 2026) for their rebellion against the leadership of former Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and her nephew Abhishek Banerjee, the party’s national general secretary, but also distanced himself from the rebel group. In an interview to The Hindu, Mr. Ray clarified that when he visited Union Minister Bhupender Yadav’s residence, he had been unaware that his former party colleagues would also be present. He was currently reflecting on whether, after a 59-year-long political career, it was time for him to “hang up his boots”. Ray, who joined the TMC in 2001 after leaving the Congress, was first elected to the Rajya Sabha in 2011, and was serving his third term.

Mr. Ray was the first TMC MP to resign from the Upper House. “Bhupender Yadav is a close friend of mine. We have served together on different parliamentary committees. When he came to know that I was resigning, he invited me over for a cup of tea,” Mr. Ray said. According to Mr. Ray, the Union Minister informed him after tea that some of his former colleagues were in another room. “I joined them and sat there for 30-40 minutes for casual conversation. The meeting had not started till then. It began only after the Honourable Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari arrived. I stayed for another 10 minutes or so and greeted Mr. Adhikari,” Mr. Ray said. He further clarified that he did not attend the meeting of rebel TMC Lok Sabha MPs, held at actor-turned-politician Shatabdi Roy’s residence in Delhi, on Monday (June 8, 2026) evening.

At the same time, however, he endorsed the rebellion, calling it “the right thing to do”. When asked about his recent complimentary remarks on the less-than-a-month-old Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in the State, Mr. Ray said: “For 49 years — 34 years of the Left Front and 15 years of the TMC — the State had turned into a desert. The new government gives everyone hope.” In his resignation letter, Mr. Ray had also said that the newly elected “people’s government” had begun taking “initiatives for the overall development and reconstruction” of West Bengal. While the “rot” had set in during the TMC’s second term in office, Mr. Ray said he had been seriously considering resigning since the R.G. Kar incident involving the rape and murder of a doctor, when he had joined the protests. Following this, he had been summoned by the State CID.

“I decided against resigning then because I saw the State machinery being used against me. I was scared,” he said. He added that despite being a party member, he had faced harassment and humiliation, and feared the situation could have been grimmer had he been outside the party. “My party leaders could even have hired goons to kill me. This has happened in several parts of the State,” Mr. Ray claimed. Calling it “the end of the road” for the TMC, Mr. Ray refused to confirm or deny whether he would join the BJP. “Whether I will join another party or not comes later. After 59 years in politics, the moot question for me is whether I should continue in politics at all,” Mr. Ray told The Hindu.

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