Tripura TMC rejigs leadership ahead of polls; Mamata Banerjee likely to visit in January

With new expanded committees, the party seems to have responded to the charge that, despite a 16.39% vote share, it doesn’t have a structured organisation and local leadership.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee (PTI Photo)

Listen to this article

00:00

1x 1.5x 1.8x

Two weeks after former Tripura Congress president Pijush Kanti Biswas was named state chief of the Trinamool Congress, the party has announced a full-fledged state committee, district and block presidents and an election committee for the Assembly polls just two months away.

The leaders also announced on Friday that the Bengal-based party was ready to go it alone in the 2023 elections and said that party supremo Mamata Banerjee and general secretary Abhishek Banerjee were likely to visit the Northeast state in the first week of January.

In an evening press conference, TMC chief Biswas announced an 87-member state committee. The committee, which has former West Bengal minister Rajib Banerjee as the state in-charge, has dropped Rajya Sabha MP Sushmita Dev as a co-state in-charge without any explanation.

Dev, however, was retained as a member of the election committee, which has Biswas as chairman and Ashish Lal Singh as vice-chairman. Singh is the son of Tripura’s first chief minister, the late Sachindra Lal Singh. Singh also served as the state convener for some time till former MLA Subal Bhowmik was chosen to head the party unit in April.

Eight months later, Bhowmik was dropped for the TMC’s “underperformance” in the Assembly bypolls, where the party scored less than 3 per cent votes. The headless party soldiered on with Rajib Banerjee and Sushmita Dev as state co-in-charges.

Read | Run-up to panchayat polls: CM Mamata Banerjee to hold Trinamool’s preparation meet on Jan 2

Now, two months ahead of the Assembly polls, the party has unveiled a state committee with presidents for 10 organisational districts and chairpersons for two organisational districts. A 17-member election committee was also announced.

The party leadership has said it will appoint observers in every block of the state. Biswas said the party had already started campaigning at the grassroots level, but state-level campaigns are yet to be launched.

Story continues below this ad

The party flaunted its growth from a 0.3 per cent vote share in the 2018 Assembly elections to a 16.39 per cent vote share in the 2021 civic polls as a precursor to the big fight it is going to put up against the ruling BJP.

However, it is often said that the Trinamool Congress does not have a structured organisation and local leadership—a charge the party seems to have responded to with the new expanded committees.

It had previously attempted thrice to expand its base in Tripura. It was former chief minister Sudhir Ranjan Majumder who started the party’s state unit in 1999.

Six Congress MLAs shifted camps and joined the party in 2016, only to further switch over to the BJP a year later. The Trinamool’s rank and file has grown since the party’s win in last year’s Bengal Assembly polls.