Newsinc24 Team 
Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla has given approval for separate seating in the House for the 20 rebel TMC MPs who have joined the Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI). Birla has also given his approval to the merger of six Shiv Sena (UBT) MPs with the Shiv Sena led by Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Eknath Shinde. With the merger of the six MPs, the strength of the Shiv Sena has gone up to 13 from seven in the Lower House of Parliament. TMC Rebel MPs have wecomed the Speaker's decision. LoP in the West Bengal State Assembly, Ritabrata Banerjee says, "The speaker is the custodian of the house. These people who had gone to NCPI were our colleagues. These 20 people have taken a collective decision, a fight between individual cult and the collective. It may be that the politics of ours is not similar to NCPI."
#WATCH | Kolkata, West Bengal: On Lok Sabha Speaker approving separate seating for 20 MPs who broke from TMC, West Bengal LoP Ritabrata Banerjee says, "The Lok Sabha Speaker is the custodian of the House, so his decision stands. He made the decision after considering everything;… pic.twitter.com/mchGma9Bmu
— ANI (@ANI) July 18, 2026
Congress MP Shashi Tharoor termed the development as “Betrayal of politics of principle. They were elected to be a strong Opposition but have chosen to become part of the ruling establishment.”
VIDEO | Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala: "This is a betrayal of the politics of principle. They were elected to be a strong Opposition, but have chosen to become part of the ruling establishment," says Congress MP Shashi Tharoor after the Lok Sabha Speaker accepted the demand of 20… pic.twitter.com/vmhoAjtC3N
— Press Trust of India (@PTI_News) July 18, 2026
Shiv Sena (UBT) Spokesperson Anand Dubey says, "Since 2022, we have been facing one crisis after another. You saw that in 2022, when our party was being split and our government was being toppled.
Meanwhile, Sudip Banerjee has been designated as the leader of the Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI) in the Lok Sabha, following a major political shift in the aftermath of the Trinamool Congress’s Assembly election defeat. Twenty ‘rebel’ MPs, who broke ranks with the party while levelling serious allegations including corruption, are now functioning under the NCPI banner and have aligned with the BJP-led NDA with the approval of Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla. On Monday, Sudip Banerjee, along with Kakali Ghosh Dastidar, met Speaker Om Birla and Union Home Minister Amit Shah to discuss procedural matters related to their new political positioning.
