Former West Bengal deputy speaker and five-time Rampurhat MLA Asish Banerjee was found dead at a Trinamool Congress office in Birbhum.
Former West Bengal Assembly deputy speaker and Trinamool Congress leader Asish Banerjee was found dead at a party office next to his residence in Rampurhat, Birbhum district, on Sunday morning.
Police said his body was found hanging and was sent for postmortem. A large crowd gathered outside the Trinamool Congress office after news of his death spread.
Asish Banerjee had served as the deputy speaker of the West Bengal Assembly when Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee was the state’s chief minister. He was also a five-time MLA from Rampurhat.
He had served as Bengal’s education and agriculture minister after Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress first came to power in the state.
Banerjee contested the West Bengal Assembly election earlier this year but lost the Rampurhat seat to BJP’s Dhruba Saha.
Banerjee stepped down as chairman of the Trinamool Congress’s Birbhum district core committee in June. At the time, he said he would continue as a general member of the party.
He lived in the Hattalapara neighbourhood of Rampurhat, with the party office where his body was found located next to his house.
The BJP won six of the 11 Assembly constituencies in Birbhum in the latest state election. This marked a significant change from 2021, when the Trinamool Congress had won 10 seats in the district while the BJP had secured one.
Police have sent Asish Banerjee’s body for postmortem as the circumstances surrounding his death are being investigated.
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