My blunder to help defeat Adhir in Murshidabad: Humayun Kabir

Janata Unnayan Party founder Humayun Kabir on Saturday said he regretted his role in his earlier party, Trinamul Congress, where he helped the TMC in defeating senior Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. He called it his “biggest blunder” of his career.

Kabir, the MLA from Bharatpur Assembly constituency under the Baharampur Lok Sabha seat, said he now repents supporting the Trinamul Congress strategy that led to Chowdhury’s defeat. Chowdhury, a former West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee president, had represented Baharampur in the Lok Sabha for five consecutive terms before losing in 2024.

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In that election, TMC had nominated former cricketer Yusuf Pathan, who defeated Chowdhury by 85,022 votes.

Addressing a select gathering of Media persons, Kabir alleged that Pathan, a Gujarat resident, had been infrequent in his constituency after the victory. “He rarely visits Baharampur and did not even come to thank the voters after being elected. The people made a mistake in defeating a five-time MP. My biggest mistake was being part of that exercise,” Kabir said.

He further asserted that he would now work towards ensuring Pathan’s “landslide defeat” in the 2029 Lok Sabha elections.

Kabir was suspended from the Trinamul Congress days before the foundation stone was laid for a proposed Babri Mosque at Beldanga in Murshidabad district, an initiative he had supported.

Subsequently, he floated his own political outfit, the Janata Unnayan Party, and called for a united front of anti-BJP and anti-Trinamul Congress forces for the forthcoming Assembly elections in West Bengal later this year.