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Journalism of Courage
Five years after he left the Trinamool Congress (TMC), there is talk in West Bengal’s political circles about former Kolkata Mayor Sovan Chatterjee rejoining the ruling party. The speculation was triggered after senior TMC leaders Aroop Biswas and Kunal Ghosh visited Chatterjee at his home in Kolkata’s Golpark area last week, party sources said. Neither Biswas nor Ghosh said anything about the meeting, with Ghosh saying “it was not a political visit”.
However, a senior TMC leader said, “The TMC’s Martyrs’ Day is on July 21. It’s the party’s biggest annual programme. We are expecting Sovan to make a return to the TMC on that occasion. Of late, Mamata Banerjee has not been happy with the working of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) or with the party’s organisation in Behala (a Kolkata suburb) from where Sovan has been twice elected MLA. Since then, we have been hearing that the CM now wants her once-trusted lieutenant to return and take responsibility for the party’s organisation in Behala.”
Asked about the CM’s reported unhappiness with the functioning of the KMC, current Mayor Firhad Hakim said, “I don’t know anything, nor am I interested.”
Chatterjee did not deny the possibility of his return to the TMC, saying, “I am very much in touch with the TMC. I also have contact with Mamata Banerjee. Whenever I have a query or need, I call Didi (Mamata Banerjee). All I can say is that whether as Mayor, Minister, or in any other post, all decisions were taken by Mamata Banerjee. She decided when to pitch me in which position. This time too, all I can say is that Mamata Banerjee will take the call.”
Once a high-profile TMC leader and close aide of the TMC chairperson — one of the many West Bengal Congress leaders who had tagged along with Mamata Banerjee when she launched the TMC in 1998 — Chatterjee used to be affectionately called by the TMC supremo by his nickname “Kanon”. As differences with the CM crept in, he stepped down from the state Cabinet and KMC in 2018 and joined the BJP in August 2019.
Chatterjee who was instrumental in strengthening the TMC in the South 24 Parganas district was roped in by the BJP to help it develop an organisational base in the region. While he wasn’t very active on the ground in his early days as a BJP leader, Chatterjee became more visible after being appointed observer of the BJP’s Kolkata Zone in January 2021.
After the TMC fielded Chatterjee’s estranged wife Ratna Chatterjee from the Behala Purba constituency, a constituency that the former Mayor won in 2011 and 2016, in the Assembly elections of 2021, there was speculation that he would get a ticket from the seat that is considered a TMC stronghold. But when the BJP released its candidate list, popular Bengali actor Payel Sarkar was found to have been chosen as the candidate from Behala Purba. Hours after the announcement, Chatterjee and his associate Baishakhi Banerjee, another TMC defector, walked out of the BJP.
Since then, there have been several times when there was speculation about Chatterjee’s return to the TMC but it didn’t materialise. He met Mamata Banerjee after he quit the BJP, but ultimately didn’t join the TMC. The last time this speculation was floated was in June 2023, when Chatterjee and Baishakhi went to the state secretariat Nabanna to meet Mamata, “I aim to fulfil Didi’s wishes. To this day, I have considered it my duty to implement Mamata Di’s thoughts, words and wishes, while taking any decision outside personal ones. Everything in my political life is centred on Mamata Banerjee,” Chatterjee said after that meeting.
