West Bengal Assembly elections: Swapan Dasgupta resigns from Rajya Sabha amid disqualification row

Swapan Dasgupta, fielded by the Bharatiya Janata Party for the West Bengal Assembly polls, on Tuesday tendered his resignation as a Rajya Sabha MP, said several media reports.This comes after Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra on Monday pointed out that Dasgupta is a nominated member of the Upper House and said that he must be disqualified for joining the BJP.The BJP has fielded Dasgupta from the Tarakeshwar Assembly constituency in Hooghly district."Swapan Dasgupta is BJP candidate for WB polls. 10th Schedule of Constitution says nominated RS member to be disqualified if he joins any political party AFTER expiry of six months from oath. He was sworn in April 2016, remains unallied. Must be disqualified NOW for joining BJP," Moitra tweeted along with a photo of the tenth schedule of the constitution.In another tweet, Moitra said, "Rajya Sabha website as of today says Swapan Dasgupta is nominated and not formally BJP. If he files nomination as a BJP candidate, he should be disqualified according to the Constitution’s 10th Schedule (Para 2 (3))."Dasgupta, a columnist, confirmed  on Twitter that he has resigned "to commit myself totally to the fight for a better Bengal." "I hope to file my nomination as BJP candidate for the Tarakeshwar Assembly seat in the next few days," he added.Dasgupta told NDTV that the issues between between him being a presidential nominee to the Rajya Sabha and him contesting the Bengal polls will be resolved by the time he files his nomiation but did not respond to Moitra's Twitter post."I have a particular status in the Rajya Sabha as a presidential nominee. I am contesting this election as a BJP candidate from Tarakeshwar. Naturally, between two things, there are a lot of outstanding issues. The nomination process involves resolving all these. And all these issues will be resolved by the time I file my nomination," he told the news channel.According to the NDTV report, Dasgupta's term was till April 2022 but he has reportedly requested that his resignation be accepted by Wednesday.Elections to the 294-member West Bengal Assembly will be conducted in eight phases between 27 March and 29 April and the counting of votes is scheduled to take place on 2 May.