Thapa is GJM acting chief after Tamang steps down

Darjeeling: The political equation in the Hills didn’t revert to the pre-2017 undivided Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM) a day after Binoy Tamang quit his GJM faction and announced that the party flag would be sent to its “rightful owner Bimal daju” or ‘big brother’ Bimal Gurung. Reason: Anit Thapa. GJM (Tamang) general secretary Thapa put his foot down after a party central committee meeting on Friday and decided against dissolving the faction.
At the emergency meeting, Binoy Tamang’s resignation was “unanimously accepted” and Thapa was declared the party’s working president with dual charge as general secretary till the central committee elected a full-time chief.The committee also reversed the decision to dissolve subdivisional panels and frontal organisations of the party.
“We cannot treat the party as our heirloom. Henceforth, we will not allow any leader to take unilateral decisions. We must get rid of the term ‘faction’ too. The party belongs to everyone,” Thapa said. “We passed a resolution at today’s meeting to recall all unilateral decisions taken by our former president (Tamang). All our committees will resume operations with immediate effect,” he added.
Almost all senior leaders of the Tamang faction were present at the GJM meeting. Sanjay Thulung, the adviser to the party’s youth front, was the only one to follow in the footsteps of Tamang and resign.
Meanwhile, supporters of Tamang reached the Patleybas party office of Bimal Gurung, who leads the other GJM faction, and handed over the party flag along with a letter. Gurung was visibly emotional. “I cried and suffered when I was away from the Hills, and thought about the party and the flag. I have no feelings of animosity; my doors are always open for him (Tamang),” Gurung said.
During the Gorkhaland agitation in 2017, Tamang was Gurung’s deputy. But, he and Thapa formed the new outfit soon after Gurung went into hiding following a shutdown in the Hills. Tamang then shook hands with chief minister Mamata Banerjee while the Gurung-led GJM faction remained a BJP ally till things changed ahead of the 2021 Bengal assembly polls. A fugitive Gurung made a public appearance in Kolkata and threw his weight behind Banerjee.
While tendering his resignation from his Dali house, 4km from Darjeeling town, on Thursday, Tamang had cited the drubbing his party received in the 2019 Lok Sabha bypoll and the recent assembly elections as the reasons behind his decision. The GJM leader had also pointed to the “growing differences” with senior party leaders.