Trinamul to speak for Sikkim in Parliament

 TT;Gangtok, Nov. 1: Sikkim Trinamul Congress president P.T. Lucksum today said party MPs from Bengal would raise the issues affecting the Himalayan state in Parliament. The Sikkim unit of Trinamul was formed in September. “We met Trinamul general secretary Mukul Roy and north Bengal development minister Gautam Deb in Darjeeling recently. They told us that all issues related to Sikkim would be taken up by Trinamul MPs in Parliament.

 The party MPs can raise matters related to our state with the President also,” Lucksum told journalists here. Asked what issues would be taken up by the Trinamul MPs in Parliament, Lucksum said: “We are discussing the issues to be raised in Parliament and they will be made public in the days to come. We will be putting forward the matters before the MPs soon.” Sikkim has two MPs, one in Lok Sabha and another in Rajya Sabha, and neither is from Trinamul.

 The state general secretary of Trinamul, Tshering Lepcha, said the party would contest the next Assembly and Parliament elections from Sikkim. “New faces will be fielded for the elections in all the constituencies of Sikkim. We will soon make our agenda for the polls public,” he added. Sikkim has 32 Assembly seats. “A party delegation will be calling on the governor after Diwali and then we will hold public meetings. We will be inviting leaders, including Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee, to our public meetings,” Lepcha said.