“We Stand Alone”; Congressional Response

Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress today announced its candidates for all 42 Lok Sabha seats in Bengal, snubbing the Congress which days ago said “the door remains open” for seat-sharing talks for the upcoming elections.

The Congress and Trinamool are part of the India Bloc, an alliance of opposition parties that have joined forces to challenge the BJP in the upcoming elections. Today’s snub is in line with Mamata Banerjee’s statement that only her party can challenge the BJP in Bengal. The collapse of talks with Congress over seats is another reason.

Soon after the Trinamool released the list, the Congress hit back.

“The Indian National Congress has repeatedly claimed that it wants a respectable seat-sharing agreement with the TMC in West Bengal. The Indian National Congress has always maintained that such an agreement must be finalized through negotiations and not unilateral announcements,” the leader said. Said Jairam Ramesh on X (formerly Twitter).

“The Indian National Congress has always wanted the Indian bloc to come together to fight the BJP,” he added.

The Indian National Congress has repeatedly claimed that it wants a respectable seat-sharing agreement with the TMC in West Bengal. The Indian National Congress has always believed that such an agreement must be negotiated and not reached unilaterally…

— Jairam Ramesh (@Jairam_Ramesh) March 10, 2024

In its candidate list for the Lok Sabha polls, the Trinamul Congress dropped at least eight sitting MLAs and brought in several new faces like former cricketer Yusuf Pathan and Kirti A Zade. Cricketer Yusuf Pathan will contest from the Baharampur Lok Sabha seat, which Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury had Won the seat five times. Sending a popular figure in Mr Chaudhry’s stronghold is also seen as the Trinamool’s response to Mr Chaudhry’s repeated attacks on the party.

The Trinamool fielded former MP Haji Nurul Islam from Sandeshkhali’s Basirhat Lok Sabha seat, ditching sitting MP Nusrat Jahan.

The Trinamool has also renominated Lok Sabha member Mahua Moitra from the Krishnanagar seat for a second consecutive term.

The Congress and the Trinamool have been trying to figure out a seat-sharing arrangement in Bengal for months, but whenever the old major party demanded more than three seats in the state, the TMC backed out of the talks.

Because of the tussle, Ms Banerjee did not join Rahul Gandhi-led India’s group on the Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra across Bengal, which prevented it from showing The opportunity could have helped the alliance counter the BJP’s political attacks on potential conflicts within the opposition front.