Won't return to CPI-M: Somnath

Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee said on Thursday that there was no question of his return to the Communist Party of India-Marxist, which had expelled him, and dubbed CPI-M Politburo member M K Pandhe's remarks ruling out his return as 'unsolicited'.

"There is no question of my return. Who has asked for return to the party? I have not asked for a return to the party," Chatterjee told PTI over phone from Bolpur. Pandhe said in New Delhi earlier today that the trust vote was a crucial time when Chatterjee defied the party and supported the Congress and therefore there was no reason for taking him back. "It is

an unsolicited response. It is ridiculous to say so," Chatterjee said while denying a press report that he would be happy if the party took him back. "It is incorrect," the Lok Sabha Speaker said.

Chatterjee was expelled from the CPI-M in July last year after he refused obey the party's diktat to quit as Speaker before the trust vote and had hit out at the party saying it could not give any direction to him in his constitutional office. He said his stance at that time was 'perfectly right'. "If a similar situation had arisen now, I would have done the same thing. "I have not left the party. The party expelled me," Chatterjee reiterated.