Ex-Assam Congress chief Ripun Bora returns to party from TMC after 2 years

Former Assam Congress chief Ripun Bora, who had recently resigned as the state Trinamool Congress president, returned to the grand old party on Sunday.

AICC general secretary in-charge of the state, Jitendra Singh, welcomed Bora back into the party fold at the beginning of an Extended Executive Committee meeting at Charaideo.

Besides Singh, state Congress president Bhupen Kumar Borah, Leader of Opposition Debabrata Saikia and other leaders were present on the occasion.

"On behalf of AICC, I welcome Ripun Bora back into the party. It is a 'ghar wapsi' (returning home) for him," Singh said.

He maintained that though Bora may have joined TMC and became its state president, Congress is in his DNA.

"We are happy that he has returned without any condition. He is with us as a party member," Singh added.

Bora, expressing happiness on returning to the Congress, said, "For whatever reasons, I had left Congress for two-and-a-half-years. But it is the demand of the state and country that BJP needs to be uprooted from power, and Congress is the only party which can do it."

He maintained that remaining with TMC would only lead to opposition vote division, which will help the saffron party, and hence, he decided to return to his old party.

"The people of Assam are fed up with the misrule of the BJP government. We will all work together to strengthen the Congress further and expose the ruling alliance's corruption and communalism before the people," Bora added.

State Congress chief Borah said the return of the former leader has been facilitated after discussion with the AICC and hoped that his coming back will strengthen the party further.

Several top functionaries of state TMC also joined the Congress along with Bora.

Bora, a former state cabinet minister and also an ex-MP who had left Congress in April 2022, had resigned from the Trinamool Congress on September 1, claiming that the people of the northeastern state consider it as a "regional party" of West Bengal and are "not willing to accept" it as their own.