Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI) has come out with its new organizational set-up of 27 members, with seven ex-Trinamool Congress (TMC) MPs getting important positions in the party. These appointments were made by NCPI National President Jyotiprokash Chatterjee on Tuesday.

The seven ex-TMC MPs who have been appointed to important positions include Abu Taher Khan, Deepak Adhikari Dev, Yusuf Pathan, Jagadish Chandra Barma Basunia, Rachana Banerjee and Mitali Bag. Khan, Dev, Pathan, Basunia and Banerjee have been made vice presidents and Bag and Bapi Halder have been assigned the post of general secretaries.

Other important appointments to be made to the new organisational set-up include Chandrima Panja as vice president and Uttiya Kundu, Sulekha Bhunia, Vivek Mishra and Shuvendu Chakraborty as general secretaries. Several others have been appointed as secretaries while Swarup Jaiswal and Sudam Jetty have been made treasurer and joint treasurer respectively.

These appointments are made after nearly four months of 20 MPs from the TMC’s Lok Sabha leaving the party to join the NCPI. In addition, the 20 TMC MPs have also backed the BJP-led NDA alliance. These new organisational appointments will make seven of these defectors formal members of the NCPI.

Notably, two of the senior TMC MPs who had quit the TMC, namely Sudip Bandyopadhyay and Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, do not feature in the list of appointees.

The political and legal position of these 20 defector MPs is still under consideration by the courts. Cases are pending in the Supreme Court against them for defection on the ground of violation of the anti-defection law. While on the other hand, the defectors claim that it was an instance of merger of their party to NCPI.

It can be said that with the announcement of its new office bearers, NCPI has formed its official national organisational structure amidst the ongoing legal and political deliberations on these former TMC MPs.