Former India cricketer and outgoing Trinamool Congress MLA Manoj Tiwary on Tuesday said his association with the party has ended. He claimed that he was denied a ticket from Howrah’s Shibpur constituency because he refused to pay Rs 5 lakh.The 40-year-old, who is Bengal’s highest run-scorer in first-class cricket with 10,195 runs, served as the Minister of State for Sports in the Mamata Banerjee-led government. The government completed its 15-year tenure before the BJP won the last parliamentary election on Monday.“Look, I am not surprised at all by this debacle. It had to happen when the entire party was indulging in corrupt practices and there was no development in any sector,” Tiwary said, according to news agency PTI.“Only those who could pay big money could buy tickets. At least 70-72 candidates this time paid around five lakh rupees to get a ticket. I was asked but I refused to pay. Just see how many of those who paid managed to win,” he said.“As far as TMC is concerned, this chapter (for me) is over,” he added, as quoted by PTI.Tiwary said he had no plans to enter politics earlier, even though the party had offered him a Lok Sabha ticket in 2019. He later agreed to contest and won from Shibpur in the 2021 assembly elections.“At that time I was playing for Punjab Kings in the IPL and was still playing Ranji Trophy seriously when Didi (Mamata) wanted me to contest in the Lok Sabha.“I politely declined, but before the 2021 elections, Didi called me again and said ‘Manoj, I have a message for you and Aroop will tell you’. I was asked to contest from Shibpur and I thought I could make a meaningful difference,” Tiwary said.Tiwary also claimed that there is no internal democracy in the TMC.“I attended meetings where all the TMC ministers were called. Now I was given a lollipop called MoS which basically meant nothing. If I stood up and said ‘Didi, I want to bring to your attention a certain issue’, she would just stop us midway and say ‘I don’t have time for you’.”He said that he tried to solve the problems of sewage and sewage in Howrah but did not get support.“As a sitting MLA, I would have run from pillar to post for drainage works in my constituency, but the people who controlled Howrah Municipality for years without allowing elections to be held never cared.“They would just stop development work, which is very basic. I can tell you that some of the work I did was not only from the MLA fund, but I also paid from my own pocket to complete the projects.“Every year, Didi announced a major plan to upgrade the underground drainage system, but that was it.”About the extortion chargeTiwary has denied allegations that he was involved in extortion.“I will tell you that when I filed my income affidavit before the 2021 elections, I declared that I had 20 million rupees in cash. I played IPL for 10 years, first-class cricket for 20 years, I was part of the Indian troops for many years.”“I don’t need money for extortion. There were 7-8 local MLAs who wrote Didi regularly. False allegations were leveled against me,” he said.On Aroop BiswasTiwary said that state sports minister Aroop Biswas did not allow him to perform his duties properly.“Aroop Da doesn’t know the A, B, C, D of any sport. There would be functions where both Aroop da and I would be invited and I wouldn’t be called on stage. There was one Durand Cup unveiling where my photos appeared on sports pages and I wouldn’t get an invite from the next Durand Cup,” he said.He also mentioned Lionel Messi’s event in Kolkata saying that he decided not to attend.“I knew something like this would happen and refrained from participating in the event. I didn’t want to be a part of the event where common people were taken for a ride. I repeatedly asked Aroop da, ‘Dada, please implement the sports policy as per the allocated budget’. He never bothered,” he added.
