India, Sept. 1 -- Twenty Lok Sabha MPs who quit the Trinamool Congress and aligned themselves with the Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI) have sought three weeks to respond to notices issued by Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla on petitions seeking their disqualification under the anti-defection law, senior leader Sudip Bandyopadhyay said on Tuesday, September 1.

The Lok Sabha Secretariat issued notices to the 20 rebel TMC MPs on August 26, asking them to submit their replies within seven days to petitions filed by TMC leader Abhishek Banerjee seeking their disqualification, sources said.

The August 25 notices were accompanied by a copy of Banerjee's petition dated June 18.

"We got a letter from the Lok Sabha Secretariat on August 26 ...