Kolkata: With less than a year to go for the 2026 assembly elections in West Bengal, the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) in the state is eyeing a major rejig in its organisational set up to keep the factional feuds under check.
Earlier this month, the TMC set up a nine-member core committee to run the show in the Darjeeling (plains) organisational district with prominent leaders in the committee, instead of choosing a new district president.
The committee included leaders such as Goutam Deb, mayor of Siliguri and former state minister, Ranjan Sarkar, deputy mayor and Papiya Ghosh, former district Trinamool president.
This is, however, not the first time that the TMC has done away with the district president’s post and has instead set up a core committee in an organisational district. Earlier core committees were set up for Birbhum and North Kolkata.
After Anubrata Mondal, the TMC strongman and the party’s Birbhum district president, was arrested by CBI in 2022 in connection with cattle smuggling, the TMC had set up a core committee to look after organisational tasks in the district. Mondal, however, wasn’t removed from his post as the district president. Earlier this year, however, the TMC removed Mondal from the district president’s post. He was made a member of the core committee and later elevated to the post of the committee’s convenor. Kajal Sheikh, arch rival of Mondal, was also included in the committee.
TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee, while addressing a party meeting, directed Mondal to work closely with Sheikh and other leaders of the committee, including TMC MP Satabdi Roy and party legislator Asish Ghosh, who heads the committee.
A similar core committee was also formed for the TMC’s North Kolkata organisational district. Sudip Banerjee was dropped from the post of the district president, instead a nine-member core committee was set up, which included MPs and MLAs. Banerjee was made the chairperson of the district.
“This is a major move by the TMC ahead of the 2026 polls to tackle the party’s internal strife. Infighting among party leaders becomes prominent if there is one district president. There may be rival lobbies. If there is a core committee, these feuds may be done away with as both lobbies are included in the committee,” said Rabindranath Bhattacharya, professor of political science at Burdwan University.
On Tuesday, the party also reshuffled the block and town presidents for the mother, youth, mahila and INTTUC frontals in three districts in north Bengal – Alipurduar, Jalpaiguri and Cooch Behar – which are considered BJP-strongholds. The TMC managed to win the Cooch Behar Lok Sabha seat in 2024.
“While out of the 16 organisational blocks in Jalpaiguri, fresh faces have been selected in at least 10 blocks, in Alipurduar, where there are eight organisational blocks, fresh appointments have been made in five blocks,” said a TMC leader from Alipurduar.
The party also made a major reshuffle in May this year when it changed the district leadership in at least 18 organisational districts in the state. The party has 35 organisational districts. The party’s top leadership had hinted at that time that more reshuffle was on the cards.
“This is the party’s decision. For now, it is district-wise and later it will take place at the block and town levels. We will take it forward after holding extensive reviews and deliberation with everyone. The reshuffle was based on performance,” Abhishek Banerjee, TMC MP had said.
Banerjee has been holding meetings with party leaders from the district and block levels. A senior party leader said that more reshuffle was expected in the next one month.
