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Cricketer Manoj Tiwary to join TMC ahead of Bengal elections: Reports

Cricketer Manoj Tiwary to join TMC ahead of Bengal elections: Reports
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Manoj Tiwary and Mamata Banerjee
By

The Bridge Desk

Updated: 4 March 2021 7:29 PM GMT

Indian cricketer Manoj Tiwary will join the Trinamool Congress (TMC) at West Bengal Chief Minister and party chief Mamata Banerjee's rally, in Hooghly district's Chinsurah, on Wednesday 24 February, as per reports of a Bengali daily.

Along with Tiwary, some members of the Congress, BJP and other "eminent personalities" are also expected to join the party at the rally. Banerjee's rally will be held in the same ground where Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed a public meeting on 22 February. The TMC rally is being seen as a counter to Modi's.

35-year-old Manoj Tiwary has represented the Indian cricket team in the one-day international (ODI) and T20 formats.

He currently represents Bengal in domestic cricket and has played for the Kolkata Knight Riders, Kings XI Punjab, and Rising Pune Supergiants in the Indian Premier League.

TMC approached Tiwary about four weeks ago as they saw him as a suitable "celebrity" replacement to cricketer Laxmi Ratan Shukla.

After meetings with Prashant Kishor's Indian Political Action Committee (I-PAC), which is handling the TMC's campaign for the upcoming West Bengal assembly elections, Tiwary met Mamata Banerjee herself to seal the deal.

Tiwary's joining will be latest in a slew of celebrity joining and defections in both the incumbent Trinamool Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), ahead of the Bengal polls scheduled for April-May.

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