NEW DELHI: Trinamool Congress general secretary Abhishek Banerjee met Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday to explore possibilities of deepening ties, a day after party chief Mamata Banerjee met Sonia Gandhi, but the regional party quashed speculation that the two parties were discussing a merger.
“The two leaders discussed a lot of issues including India’s alliance plans and the way forward for the two parties. There were also some political discussions related to Rahul Gandhi’s remarks at the India meeting on vote stealing,” said a senior TMC leader, privy to the details.
“There were also discussions on improving coordination and India’s next meeting to be held in Hyderabad,” the leader said.
However, successive meetings revealed a sense of desperation within the TMC which lost power in West Bengal last month after 15 years. Since then, the party has moved from one crisis to another – first, 59 of its 78 state legislators rebelled (two were expelled) and backed Ritabrata Banerjee as Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly, then at least 16 Lok Sabha members rebelled and met Prime Minister Suvendu Adhikari, and two of its 13 Rajya Sabha members resigned.
Former Congress Lok Sabha leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said, “I am not an astrologer. I have no information about any merger or such things related to Bengal. Maybe if a formal decision is reached on any issue, we will definitely have confidence. As far as the TMC party is concerned, you can all see that the party has been dispersed, and senior party leaders are walking around… For a long time, they never felt the need to meet with the Congress party leaders. However, now they feel that maybe they should.”
The TMC did not rule out the possibility of an alliance with the Congress Party in West Bengal, something it had avoided for the past 14 years. “There was strong interconnectedness,” a senior TMC leader said when asked about the meeting on Wednesday.
In 2011, Mamata Banerjee came to power in alliance with the Congress Party. In September 2012, Congress ministers in Banerjee’s government resigned after TMC withdrew from the United Progressive Alliance. “In this case, a tie-up with Congress is beneficial for Mamata,” a senior Congress leader said.
Emphasizing the importance of the meeting, the TMC noted that the meeting was scheduled to last for 45 minutes but continued for 88 minutes. The TMC is also in touch with the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), which did not attend the India bloc meeting on Monday.
On Tuesday, Mamata Banerjee met Congress Parliamentary Party president Sonia Gandhi for 50 minutes at the latter’s residence 10 in Janpath.
The TMC and Congress leaders also indicated that the two sides have coordinated on the timeline and plans. “It was even decided that instead of all the leaders, the Congress would address the media. In the Sonia-Mamata meeting, discussions took place extensively on the India alliance. At the end of the meeting, it was decided that there should be another meeting between the two parties,” a Congress leader said.
TMC officers are expected to meet Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge soon.
Kolkata-based political commentator Suman Chattopadhyay described the meetings as “of little benefit.” “The Congress must go with the Left in West Bengal for its revival. Gandhi must not forget how Mamata won the 2011 elections with the help of the Congress and, over the next 15 years, did her best to demolish the Congress in West Bengal.”
Meanwhile, Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said in a post on X: “Some of the news reports about what supposedly happened in the meeting between Mrs. Sonia Gandhi and Mrs. Mamata Banerjee are completely inaccurate. The meeting was very cordial and many personal matters were talked about, given their long relationship.”
