Farmers Movement Archive

Mamata Banerjee activating TMC’s next generation with eye on future: Veterans

Activating a younger and versatile leadership and eradicating centralism in the ranks of the 23-year-old Trinamool Congress (TMC) party was Mamata Banerjee’s intention behind the reshuffles and an array of do’s and don’ts she announced on Saturday, party veterans and experts have said. They also feel that the Bengal chief minister wants to play a larger role in national politics prior to the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.Asking her leaders to get their act together, Banerjee announced that after one month nobody will hold more than one post and said nepotism and corruption would no longer be tolerated, a move that seemed to address the allegations of corruption raised by the opposition in recent years. She even imposed a ban on use of beacons in cars used by ministers.The reshuffles she announced stunned many.Most of the young leaders, as well as older ones, Banerjee put in charge of important wings of her party are educated, have good oratory skills and last but not the least, speak Bengali, English and Hindi. The last attribute, experts and TMC veterans feel, is found lacking in most frontline leaders of other parties in Bengal.TMC leaders said election strategist Prashant Kishor, who was roped in by the chief minister’s 33-year-old nephew and Lok Sabha MP Abhishek Banerjee after the party’s debacle in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, advised the party to groom and project young and educated people. This was one of the reasons for the alienation of many old leaders who joined the BJP.“Our party has plans to extend its activities to some other states. What this will lead to remains to be seen,” TMC’s senior Lok Sabha member Saugata Roy told HT on Saturday night.It was a significant statement in view of the assembly polls to be held next year in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-ruled Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat and Congress-ruled Punjab and also the 2024 general elections. Roy, however, refused to divulge more.For the record, TMC attempted to project Banerjee as the next prime minister prior to the 2019 Lok Sabha polls but the alliance she tried to forge with regional forces was no match for the BJP.Explaining the rationale behind the one-man-one-post policy, Roy said, “Many parties follow this. It has been done so that one can devote full time to whatever he is doing.”The chief minister made her nephew the TMC’s national general secretary, a move some senior leaders in the TMC had anticipated. The post was earlier held by Subrata Bakshi, one of the chief minister’s oldest aides.Though it became somehow apparent after the TMC’s resounding victory in the assembly polls that Abhishek Banerjee might be rewarded, many feel that placing him next to his aunt in the hierarchy is part of a strategic move.The chief minister and Abhishek Banerjee became the prime targets in the campaign speeches of all BJP leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and union home minister Amit Shah. They were referred to as pishi (aunt) and bhaipo (nephew) in almost all speeches and the chief minister was accused of establishing dynastic rule.“Abhishek worked for the party with dedication. He scored full marks. He deserves the new position,” said panchayat minister Subrata Mukherjee who was senior to Mamata Banerjee in the Congress and later joined the TMC.“Abhishek drastically transformed himself in the last two years. He lost weight, honed his oratory skills and took the lead in campaigns and party programmes. Probably he was advised by Kishor but one cannot deny that he has earned his place,” said columnist and political analyst Suvashis Maitra.“Although I am surprised that no Muslim leader has been promoted despite the community’s contribution to the TMC’s electoral success, the organizational changes are significant. By projecting the next line of leadership, Banerjee has tried to counter the public perception that TMC is run by one person only. Also, she is looking at the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. She may emerge as a key player in either the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) headed by Congress or a new alliance of regional forces against the BJP,” Maitra added.What people did not foresee was that the important post of president of the TMC’s youth wing, which Abhishek Banerjee vacated on Saturday, would be given to 28-year-old actress Saayoni Ghosh, who joined politics on the eve of the recent state polls, which she contested and lost. Known for her oratory skills, Ghosh became the TMC youth front’s first woman president ever since the party was formed by Banerjee in 1998 after she left the Congress where she, too, was president of the youth front.“I am grateful to the chief minister and to Abhishek Banerjee. This is a huge responsibility. I will not let them down,” said Ghosh who was trolled by the BJP supporters during the polls for an old social media post relating to a Hindu deity.“Ghosh’s appointment should enthuse not only the youth but women as well. She is very articulate and popular. There is a difference between grooming someone who is already into politics and introducing someone who comes from a different world. Ghosh, however, will need constant guidance as many old-timers will try to pull her down,” said political science professor and election analyst Udayan Bandopadhyay.Former Communist Party of India (Marxist) Rajya Sabha member Ritabrata Banerjee, 41, who was expelled by the party on disciplinary grounds in 2017 and joined the TMC in 2018, was made the state president of the TMC’s trade union wing. In the CPI(M), Banerjee, who was known to be close to former chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, was also the national general secretary of the Student’s Federation of India. In the TMC, he played a key role in strengthening the organization in some north Bengal districts where the BJP made deep inroads in 2019.Another newcomer to politics, popular Bengali film director Raj Chakraborty, 46, was made the head of the TMC’s cultural front. He won the Barrackpore assembly seat in North 24 Parganas district in the recent polls although the BJP did well in the district in the last general election.Projecting young leaders has been a salient part of the TMC’s internal strategy since the 2019 Lok Sabha polls in which BJP bagged 18 of the state’s 42 seats and TMC’s tally went down from 34 to 22. The chief minister said on several occasions that she was putting in place the next generation of leaders. In the assembly polls, younger candidates were fielded from at least 100 of the 292 seats the TMC contested. Bengal has 294 assembly seats but the TMC left out two for its allies in the Darjeeling hills. The BJP bagged only 77 seats against its target to wrest more than 200.The chief minister, however, did not leave out all the seniors on Saturday.Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, 61, a doctor and three-time Lok Sabha member, was made president of the women’s front and Rajya Sabha member Dola Sen, 54, who was once a far-Left student union leader, was made national head of the trade union front. During the recent farmers’ movement in Punjab and Delhi, Sen welcomed peasant leader Rakesh Tikait when he visited Bengal.A third veteran leader, Purnendu Bose, 68, who served as minister of labour, agriculture and technical education between 2011 and 2021, has been given charge of the peasants’ front. Bose was not fielded in the recent polls but Banerjee said he would play a new role.During the polls, BJP alleged that Abhishek Banerjee is involved in the coal smuggling case that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is probing. It is alleged that illegally mined coal, worth hundreds of crores of rupees, have been sold in the black market over several years by a racket operating in the western parts of Bengal where the Eastern Coalfields Limited runs mines.The CBI questioned Abhishek Banerjee’s wife Rujira Banerjee and her sister Maneka Gambhir. The latter’s husband, Ankush Arora, and his father Pawan Arora were also grilled. The TMC leaders alleged that the BJP is using the agency to keep the chief minister under pressure.

Hindustan Times

06-06-2021

India