TMC MLAs Sonali Guha, Dipendu Biswas, Rabindranath Bhattacharya, Jatu Lahiri and TMC candidate from Habibpur Sarala Murmu joined the BJP in the presence of West Bengal Party President Dilip Ghosh, BJP leaders Suvendu Adhikari and Mukul Roy on Monday.

Tollygunge actor Tanushree Chakraborty also joined the saffron party.

Interestingly, except Sarala Murmu, all the other sitting MLAs were denied tickets. Murmu was given a ticket but was dropped from the TMC’s list this morning after it became clear she is defecting, sources told News18.

The CPM has signed a seat-sharing agreement with DMK for six seats in Tamil Nadu. More or less DMK has finalised seat sharing with all big parties in the state. Congress (25), CPM, CPI, VCK and MDMK (6 seats each out of which MDMK candidates will contest in DMK symbol) IUML has got 3 seats, MMK 2.

A day after leading a padyatra against the Centre over the steep hike in fuel prices, including those of LPG cylinders, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee will mark International Women’s Day with another padyatra. As PM Narendra Modi addressed a rally at Kolkata’s Brigade Parade ground yesterday, Banerjee hit out at the BJP, saying the party didn’t come in the state for development but for their own promotion. “BJP doesn’t come here for work or development, they only come for their own promotion. But before promotion they should answer why the price of LPG petrol and diesel are rising. There’ll be no ‘poriborton’ in Bengal but there will be ‘poriborton’ in Delhi,” Banerjee said.

Taking a dig at Modi’s promise of “Sonar Bangla”, Mamata said, “They say they’ll make West Bengal Sonar Bangla, they’re not even capable of doing any development work in centre…India knows about a syndicate that is Modi and Amit Shah’s syndicate.” The Bengal chief minister was seen carrying a cardboard replicas of LPG cylinder as she led protest against price rise of LPG cylinders. Her rally began from Darjeeling More and crosed Mahananda Bridge, which is at the heart of Siliguri. “I’ve never seen a PM who lies everywhere. He doesn’t know anything but to lie. PM reads his speeches from teleprompter in Bengal. He writes the Bengali slogans in Gujarati,” she added.

Hitting out at the BJP, Mamata also said that before elections it’s ujala and post elections it’s ‘jumla’ (speeches). “People will not tolerate BJP’s lies. If they bribe you for votes, you know what to do. Bengal doesn’t want their ‘tolabazi’ and ‘jumla’,” she said. Sunday witnessed a fierce contest between the two sides as both Mamata Banerjee and PM Modi addressed rallies in the state.