India, Aug. 4 -- In what is being termed as a "defection 2.0", at least three senior TMC leaders, including former heavy-duty ministers, were leaving the Mamata Banerjee faction of the Trinamool Congress to join the Nationalist Citizens Party of India.

According to sources, TMC leader and former high-profile Bengal Minister Dr Shashi Panja engaged in a private meeting with NCPI leader and MP Dr Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar along with another former TMC minister. "Not only Shashi Panja but also another former very powerful minister had come," a kind of Dr Ghoshdastidar said. Dr Panja is a close relative of former Union Minister Ajit Panja.

The duo met at the clinic of Ghoshdastidar on Sunday evening, sources said. Both are medical practitioners...