Trinamool lacks capacity to conspire: Mukul Roy

Kolkata, March 21 (IANS) Denying charges of subverting loyalty of party legislators, sidelined Trinamool Congress leader Mukul Roy Saturday also mocked talk of a conspiracy against him in the Mamata Banerjee-led party, saying it was yet to secure such capacity.

"I deny all the charges that the party has brought against me," the Trinamool Rajya Sabha member told media persons reacting to reports that he coaxed four suspended party members in the Manipur Assembly to join the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Asked if the charges were part of a conspiracy by the Trinamool against him, Roy replied: "They have not yet secured that type of capacity to hatch a conspiracy".

Roy has been stripped of all party posts with speculation that the Trinamool was planning taking disciplinary action against him.

Once the right hand man of Banerjee and credited as the architect of Trinamool's electoral success, Roy refused to comment on his party not entrusting him with any responsibility concerning the April 18 Kolkata Municipal Corporation elections.

Meanwhile, Roy welcomed Banerjee's decision to call for a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) into the gang-rape of a nun in Nadia district earlier this month but said the performance of the central agency was "not good".

"CBI will probe the matter accordingly. We had sought a CBI enquiry in Nandigram firing, in the Chhoto Angaria massacre, and it other cases, although the performance of the CBI is not good," he said.

Facing backlash over police's failure to arrest any of the culprits who had gang-raped the septuagenarian nun in Ranaghat in Nadia district, Banerjee March 18 announced entrusting the CBI with the probe. The agency however, is yet to formally take over.