The internal power struggle tearing through the Trinamool Congress (TMC) reached a point of no return on Monday. In an extraordinary show of defiance, a rebel faction led by the Leader of the Opposition, Ritabrata Banerjee, declared open mutiny against the party's central leadership. Gathering at a luxury hotel in New Town, the dissident camp announced a parallel organizational structure and appointed senior MLA Arup Roy as the chairperson of what they are now calling the “real” Trinamool Congress.

This sweeping rebellion is a direct, unprecedented challenge to the absolute authority of party founder and West Bengal’s long-standing political titan, Mamata Banerjee. Signaling just how deep this organizational rift goes, the rebel camp took the aggressive step of announcing the suspension of TMC National General Secretary Abhishek Banerjee, a move calculated to shake both the legislative and organizational foundations of the party.

This represents the most severe internal crisis Mamata Banerjee has ever faced. Following the party's defeat in the West Bengal Assembly elections—which brought an end to its 15-year rule—the TMC has been crippled by a steady departure of key figures. Growing frustration among sitting legislators and parliamentarians has left the future trajectory of the political outfit deeply uncertain.

Redefining the Party Structure

The dramatic breakaway was formalized during an emergency meeting orchestrated by Ritabrata Banerjee and a cohort of rebel TMC legislators. The high-profile gathering drew an array of senior leaders, including heavyweight figures like Firhad Hakim, Arup Biswas, Javed Khan, Sandipan Saha, Asim Bose, Jui Biswas, and Tarak Singh. They were joined by numerous municipal councillors, former elected representatives, and grassroots party functionaries traveling from various districts across West Bengal.

According to organizers, the session was urgently called to resolve a profound "constitutional crisis" brewing within the party. Speaking to the attendees, Ritabrata Banerjee argued that the official TMC constitution strictly mandates the formation of a new National Working Committee (NWC) every three years. He pointed out that because the last committee was formed back in February 2022, its legitimate tenure had lapsed without any official reconstitution, meaning the existing leadership structure had completely lost its constitutional validity.

To fix this perceived legal vacuum, the assembly voted to establish their own National Working Committee. The panel initially featured a core group of prominent names:

• Arup Roy
• Firhad Hakim
• Arup Biswas
• Biplab Mitra
• Akhruzzaman Ansari
• Sabina Yasmin
• Sandipan Saha
• Rathin Ghosh
• Javed Khan
• Ritabrata Banerjee

The committee's ranks were quickly expanded to include 30 members in total.

Following its formation, Arup Roy, a highly respected veteran legislator representing the Howrah Central constituency, was officially elected as the new chairperson through a unanimous voice vote. The renegade administration then distributed key leadership portfolios: Firhad Hakim, Arup Biswas, Rathin Ghosh, and Sabina Yasmin were appointed as vice-chairpersons. Meanwhile, Ritabrata Banerjee, Javed Khan, and Sandipan Saha took up the mantles of general secretaries, and Akhruzzaman Ansari was given the responsibility of managing the finances as treasurer. In an effort to assert institutional transparency, the newly formed body also passed a resolution to hire an independent auditor to thoroughly review the party’s financial books.

The dissident faction strongly maintains that this new committee is the only legitimate continuation of the Trinamool Congress. They argue that the previous leadership failed to uphold the essential democratic and organizational rules set out by the party’s own charter. Inside sources from the rebel camp claim that nearly 60 MLAs and a vast number of municipal councillors—including several prominent figures within the Kolkata Municipal Corporation—either personally attended the New Town meeting or formally sent messages of support for the resolutions.

A Crisis Expanding Across State and Parliament

This open rebellion is the result of weeks of rapidly building momentum. Earlier, a clear majority of TMC legislators broke ranks to support Ritabrata Banerjee’s bid for the crucial post of Leader of the Opposition, openly ignoring the candidate chosen by Mamata Banerjee’s inner circle. Since that first victory, the dissident camp has confidently asserted that it controls the loyalty of at least 65 MLAs in the state Assembly.

The instability has also completely altered the balance of power at the national level. In an incredibly damaging blow to Mamata Banerjee’s federal footprint, at least 20 of the TMC’s 28 Lok Sabha Members of Parliament broke away from the main Trinamool Congress Parliamentary Party. They chose to merge entirely with the Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI) while offering their legislative backing to the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA). This massive defection has gutted the party's presence in New Delhi and pushed the internal civil war into a high-stakes legal battle over the very identity of the Trinamool Congress.

The Legislative Counteroffensive over the Chief Whip

As the organizational war raged, the legislative battlefield inside the West Bengal Assembly turned ugly. Seeking to penalize those switching sides, Mamata Banerjee’s loyalists launched a sharp counter-strategy. They requested the immediate removal of former Kolkata Mayor Firhad Hakim from his post as the party's Chief Whip in the Assembly, proposing Kamarhati MLA Madan Mitra as his immediate successor.

This move came just hours after the formal TMC leadership issued a strict show-cause notice to Hakim, accusing him of blatant anti-party activities for accepting a high-ranking vice-chairperson position in the rebels' parallel administration.

According to insiders within the Mamata Banerjee camp, an official electronic communication was dispatched to Assembly Speaker Rathindra Bose at approximately 10:45 PM on Monday night. The email explicitly stated that Hakim should no longer be recognized as the TMC’s Chief Whip and demanded that Madan Mitra be formally instated. The next morning, prior to the opening bell of the legislative session, senior TMC veteran and the high command's official choice for LoP, Sovandeb Chattopadhyay, personally walked into the Speaker’s office to hand over a physical, signed copy of the late-night request.

However, the Speaker’s office firmly chose not to act on the petition, noting that the ongoing legal and procedural fights surrounding the party split made the matter entirely sub-judice. Representatives for Mamata Banerjee tried to counter this by arguing that while the broader leadership of the legislature party was tied up in court, there was no specific injunction or ongoing legal case preventing the party from changing its own Chief Whip. The Speaker's office declined to give an immediate comment on the matter.

The aggressive move to replace Hakim highlights the total breakdown of trust between the two factions. For decades, Hakim was universally seen as one of Mamata Banerjee’s absolute closest political confidants and a fiercely loyal lieutenant. Yet, he chose to join the dissident camp's organizational meeting, cementing his defection by accepting a top spot in their parallel leadership. This falling out was foreshadowed just two days prior, when Mamata Banerjee’s camp drastically altered the party’s central National Working Committee list, scrubbing the names of several leaders who had drifted toward the rebels, including both Hakim and former minister Aroop Biswas.

This entire structural collapse traces its roots back to the shock defeat in the state polls. The very first fracture appeared when 58 of the TMC's 80 elected MLAs explicitly backed the previously expelled leader, Ritabrata Banerjee, for LoP, completely ignoring the high command's preferred candidate, Sovandeb Chattopadhyay. Soon after, the rebel camp pushed further by electing Akhruzzaman Ansari as their own Chief Whip to bypass Hakim entirely. In response, Mamata Banerjee filed a lawsuit in the Calcutta High Court, legally challenging the Speaker’s decision to recognize Ritabrata Banerjee’s status as LoP.

Since that moment, the fight has spilled out of the state house and into the streets, with both sides setting up separate committees, trying to seize control of party physical infrastructure, and preparing to take their arguments to election regulators.

Pre-Empting the Battle at the Election Commission

On Tuesday, the battlefront moved to the national stage. Mamata Banerjee’s camp revealed that they had proactively finalized a thoroughly revamped, 24-member National Working Committee on Saturday. Crucially, they claimed they successfully transmitted this official office-bearers list to the Election Commission of India (ECI) on Monday morning—hours before the rebel faction could gather in New Town to announce her removal as chairperson.

This disclosure was made just as rebel leaders prepared a formal visit to the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) of West Bengal to submit their own claims, looking to open up a fresh legal front over who owns the party name and symbols originally registered by Mamata Banerjee back in 1998.

“While the rebel camp was making preparations for its own NWC, Mamata Banerjee had already finalized the party’s organizational structure and sent the list to the EC as the chairperson of the TMC,” a senior leader from her camp stated to the Press Trust of India.

According to sources, the official document delivered to the polling panel firmly names Mamata Banerjee as Chairperson, Subrata Bakshi as Vice-President, Abhishek Banerjee as National General Secretary, Derek O’Brien and Dola Sen as Joint Secretaries, and Subhasish Chakraborty as Treasurer.

This updated roster showed a massive housecleaning compared to the committee announced earlier in the month. It completely dropped several big-name leaders who had crossed over to the rebel side, such as Firhad Hakim and Aroop Biswas, while introducing fresh faces like Rajya Sabha MP Nadimul Haque into the high command.

The timing of the submission was clearly intended to block the legal standing of the rebels' New Town meeting. Undeterred, the dissident camp doubled down on Tuesday afternoon, with their leadership planning a formal visit to the regional CEO’s office right after the assembly adjourned, seeking recognition as the one true Trinamool Congress.

Concurrently, the official TMC disciplinary committee issued a fresh wave of show-cause notices targeting a wide range of senior defectors, including Firhad Hakim, Aroop Biswas, Arup Roy, Javed Khan, Rathin Ghosh, Biplab Mitra, Snehasis Chakraborty, and Sabina Yasmin.

Senior TMC spokesperson Kunal Ghosh completely dismissed the rebel camp's actions with fierce public criticism. He stated:

“It is a comedy show. A man who has been expelled from the TMC is holding a special session. The matter is in court and we believe justice will be done. We do not give any importance to such comical behaviour. The TMC is equal to Mamata Banerjee. All else is a circus.”

Ritabrata Banerjee quickly fired back, stoutly defending the legal validity of his faction's maneuverings. He countered:

“Kunal Ghosh is not the Election Commission. Whatever we have done has been strictly in accordance with the law.”

This deep organizational war has also turned into a fight over the party's money. The rebel camp recently took the aggressive step of approaching local police authorities to demand the freezing of transactions across three primary TMC bank accounts. This move triggered an active law enforcement inquiry into the party's finances, proving that the dissidents are fully prepared to squeeze the high command on every single front.

With the party also witnessing devastating high-profile resignations from the Rajya Sabha—including that of veteran lawmaker Sukhendu Sekhar Roy—political analysts believe the survival of the party now rests entirely on one single question: which of these two rival organizational structures will the Election Commission ultimately recognize as valid? With both factions claiming total legal legitimacy over both the lawmakers in the assembly and the administrative core of the party, this historic feud is destined for a long, bruising battle through the halls of the ECI and the highest courts of the land.