April 11, 2023
NEW DELHI – In a setback for West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress, India’s Election Commission today revoked its status as a national party.
Meanwhile, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) was elevated to a national party.
The EC also withdrew the national party status of Sharad Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and Communist Party of India (CPI), reports our New Delhi correspondent.
Last week, the Karnataka High Court directed the ECI to pass appropriate orders regarding the national party status of AAP by April 13.
The EC said AAP has been named a national party based on its performance in assembly elections in Delhi, Punjab, Goa and Gujarat. The party is in power in Delhi and Punjab. The AAP got 6.77% of the total vote share in the assembly poll held in Goa in March last year. The party won five seats in the Gujarat assembly elections also last year.
The ECI had issued show-cause notices to the TMC, NCP and CPI in July 2019, asking them to reply why their national party status should not be revoked after their performance in the previous Lok Sabha elections that year.
Under paragraph 6B the Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) Order, 1968, a party is eligible for the national party status if it is a recognised state party in four or more states, if its candidates polled at least six percent of the total valid votes polled in four or more states in the last Lok Sabha or assembly election and it has at least four MPs elected in the last election or if it wins at least two percent of the total Lok Sabha seats in at least three states.
The EC decision would be a blow to the TMC aspirations to go national and position Mamata on the national stage as a prime ministerial candidate.
The TMC put up a poor show in assembly elections in Goa last year and in Tripura and Meghalaya earlier this year.