AMID speculation that he is likely to join the Trinamool Congress”, BJP Kharagpur Sadar MLA Hiran Chatterjee on Saturday said he would never join a party which was “involved in corruption and unethical practices”.
The actor-turned-politician better known as Hiran only told reporters that a purported picture of him with Trinamool Congress National General Secretary Abhishek Banerjee being circulated in social media was morphed and he had last met Banerjee before joining the BJP in early 2021
Following the circulation of the purported photograph, speculations were rife that Chatterjee might defect to the TMC.
Speaking with reporters on Saturday, Chatterjee said, “There is no question of defecting to the TMC. It is just a rumour. No honest person will join the TMC, which is full of corrupt leaders and thieves. I have no intention to join such a party.”
Denying the rumours that he met Abhishek Banerjee at the latter’s office earlier this month, Chatterjee said, “I had never gone to Banerjee’s office in recent times. I had last met him before the 2021 Assembly polls. Since then, I never met him. The purported photograph, which is being circulated on social media, is morphed. This can be easily done in this age of artificial intelligence.”
The BJP MLA, however, maintained that he had “good relations” with Banerjee and had accompanied Banerjee to many programmes. “I was in touch with him from 2014 to January 2021. But afterwards, I never met him,” he claimed.
On the other hand, TMC’s Paschim Medinipur district coordinator Ajit Maity, who was seen in the photograph with Chatterjee, said the BJP MLA is “hiding the truth”.
“He is not speaking the truth. He is hiding the fact by saying it is a fake photograph. He is making a complete U-turn. We had heard about double standards, but this is beyond that. It is more like triple standard,” alleged Maity.
Reacting to Chatterjee’s claims, Abhishek Banerjee asked him to “file a defamation suit and a police complaint if he thinks his photograph was morphed”.
“Had I been in Hiran Chatterjee’s place and, if anyone had circulated my fake photograph, I would have first filed a civil defamation case and followed it up with a criminal case with the police. I would ask Hiran to do these two things first before making statements. BJP already has several investigative agencies at its disposal. They can easily find out where Hiran was on that day,” said Banerjee.
