Mukul Roy, former Railway Minister and senior Trinamool Congress leader, died of cardiac arrest at 1:30 am on Sunday at Apollo Hospital. His son, Subhranshu Roy, confirmed the news. Roy had been battling multiple health issues and was suffering from dementia. He had slipped into a coma a few days ago.
Subhranshu said his father suffered a massive cardiac arrest and could not be revived. Over the past two years, Roy’s health had steadily declined. He frequently required hospitalisation, lost the ability to recognise familiar faces and was being fed liquid food through a Ryle’s tube. His last rites will be performed on Monday after his body is brought back to his Kolkata residence.
Once regarded as the closest aide of West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and the second-in-command in the All India Trinamool Congress, Roy played a pivotal role in building the party’s organisational strength. However, in 2017, he switched to the Bharatiya Janata Party ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, a move that reshaped Bengal’s political landscape.
In the BJP, Roy emerged as a key strategist and was instrumental in engineering defections from rival parties. He helped the BJP put up a strong performance in the 2019 Indian general election in West Bengal, where the party won 18 of the state’s 42 seats, establishing itself as the principal opposition force.
He later contested the 2021 West Bengal Legislative Assembly election on a BJP ticket and won from Krishnanagar. However, his influence within the party gradually diminished, and he eventually returned to the Trinamool Congress.
Roy left the BJP shortly after Suvendu Adhikari became Leader of the Opposition following his victory over Mamata Banerjee in Nandigram in the 2021 Assembly polls.
Often described as the “Chanakya of Bengal politics” for his organisational skills and strategic acumen, Roy co-founded the Trinamool Congress with Mamata Banerjee in 1998 and later rose to become its national general secretary. After the party ended the Left Front’s 34-year rule in 2011, he was appointed Minister of State for Shipping in the UPA II government and subsequently served as Railway Minister from March to September 2012.
His political career, however, faced setbacks after his name surfaced in the Saradha chit fund scam and he was caught in a sting operation linked to the Narada case. In 2015, he was removed from the post of Trinamool Congress general secretary, marking a turning point in his long and eventful political journey.