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‘Mamata with a modern touch’: Why Trinamool has come around to Abhishek as party heir

For a long time, 34-year-old Diamond Harbour MP Abhishek Banerjee — seen as Mamata's heir — faced opposition not only from the BJP but also within his own party. 

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Kolkata: In the run-up to the Trinamool Congress’s Martyrs’ Day rally in Kolkata, posters put up across the state featured just two leaders — West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and her nephew Abhishek Banerjee, an MP and the party’s national general secretary.

On Thursday, as he stood to address the rally in a heavy downpour, Abhishek asked the crowd if he should put away his umbrella. 

When they chanted “yes”, he put it away and stood in the pouring rain, telling the gathering of thousands how the Trinamool Congress was no longer restricted to Bengal.   

“We are now in Agartala, Assam, Goa, and Meghalaya,” Abhishek said in his 17-minute speech. “All this has happened in the one year since I became the party’s general secretary.”

For a long time, the 34-year-old Diamond Harbour MP — seen as Mamata’s heir — faced opposition not only from the BJP but also within his own party

As TMC leaders left the party in droves to join the BJP ahead of the 2021 assembly elections, Abhishek was at the receiving end of the blame. The BJP not only received the MLAs but it also accused the TMC of being a “bua-bhatija (aunt-nephew)” party.     

But things have turned around for the young leader since: His party leaders no longer seem apologetic about projecting him as Mamata’s successor.  

From sitting to have tea with villagers, to making morale-boosting speeches to the party’s youth, to visiting veteran TMC leaders’ houses to seek their blessings, he seems to be everywhere. It was Abhishek who, after the 2019 general elections, brought in election strategist Prashant Kishor to meet Mamata Banerjee at the state secretariat.

It’s Abhishek who’s now expanding the party in other parts of the country — Tripura, Goa, Assam, and Meghalaya. He is also working with the leaders on the ground and strategising. 

“It now clear that Abhishek is being projected as the natural successor of Mamata Banerjee,” said Udayan Bandhopadhyay, a political science professor at Bangabasi College in Kolkata. “But it’s the BJP that made him a leader by constantly attacking him in their election rallies in West Bengal. If you continuously do that, you end up creating a leader. This is called natural selection procedure in politics.”

Trinamool Congress spokesperson Kunal Ghosh said Abhishek brings a modern touch to the party’s politics.

“Mamata Banerjee is power, she is an emotion, a symbol of struggle and protest. Abhishek has imbibed all of these and has added the modern touch as times have changed,” he told ThePrint. “Politics now is very different from how politics was even a decade ago. Abhishek strives to resolve the problems at hand by using his public relations skills on the ground and social media reach online.”


Also Read: ‘BJP won’t get majority, TMC will unite oppn’ — Mamata lays out 2024 road map at Kolkata rally


‘Ek Daake Abhishek’

Abhishek’s outreach programme ‘Ek Daake Abhishek (Abhishek at one call)” — initially launched on 18 June in the seven assembly constituencies of Diamond Harbour — has now been extended to three hill areas: Jalpaiguri, Cooch Behar and Alipurduar

The BJP won the Jalpaiguri, Cooch Behar and Alipurduar parliamentary seats in 2019 and, in the assembly elections of 2021, managed to score seven of their 11 assembly seats despite the TMC’s overall win.

In essence, ‘Ek Daake Abhishek’ is much the same as ‘Didi Ke Bolo (Tell Didi)’ — an initiative that Kishor’s Indian Political Action Committee (I-PAC) launched ahead of last year’s West Bengal polls. It’s a 24×7 helpline not only for grievances but also to offer suggestions to leaders

The Abhishek helpline is said to have received 1.5 lakh calls from Diamond Harbour since the initiative was launched on 18 June.  

“Most of the complaints received have been related to issues regarding health services, law and order problems. At least 39,000 calls were received from other parts of West Bengal,” a press release shared by I-PAC said. 

Derek O’Brien, Trinamool Parliamentary leader, Rajya Sabha, told ThePrint that Abhishek had “splendid organisational skills and strong trilingual communication skills”.   

“After doing outstanding work as the head of the youth wing of the party for many years and delivering as a two-time Lok Sabha MP, Abhishek was elevated to national general secretary one year ago,” he said. “He has both splendid organisational skills and strong trilingual communication skills. That’s a special blend. India will get to know him better in the years and decades ahead.”

Thursday marked the first time that Abhishek addressed the press outside Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s residence to explain the TMC’s road map. He also announced that the party would abstain from the vice-presidential elections on 6 August.

The press conference is significant because it’s usually either Mamata Banerjee herself, senior party leaders such as Partha Chatterjee and Subrata Bakshi, or the party’s floor leaders in either the Lok Sabha or the Rajya Sabha, who address the press.

A leader in the making

It was in 2011, the same year his aunt Mamata defeated the 34-year-old rule of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) in West Bengal, that Abhishek took the political plunge. 

The first member of Mamata Banerjee’s own family to enter politics and be part of the Trinamool Congress, Abhishek was appointed the TMC’s youth president on 21 July 2011 at the Martyrs’ Day rally in Kolkata.  

He became an MP for the first time three years later.

Jayanta Ghosal, the author of Mamata Beyond 2021, told ThePrint that Abhishek was “bringing a new structure into the organisation of the Trinamool Congress [and] trying to both deepen it and widen it”. 

“He is keen to flush out rogue elements, rebuild district units on modern lines and rid the party of extortion and corruption. Abhishek is polishing the image of the Trinamool Congress and he is the undisputed No. 2 in the Trinamool,” he said. 

The 2021 assembly election saw both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah accuse Abhishek of running an “unchallenged empire of extortion and syndicate”.

At a rally he addressed in West Bengal’s Dumurjula on 1 February 2021, Shah also said: “Modi government works for public welfare while Mamata Banerjee dispensation is bothered about nephew’s welfare”.

Those in the party, however, refute the dynasty charge.  

“The BJP should not be the one speaking about dynastic politics, it [has] a long list,” Ghosh told ThePrint. “You can give a chair to someone, but you can’t make a leader. Abhishek has established himself and that is why the BJP knows where the threat lies. Abhishek is constantly grooming his skills and he is now a tested leader. Mamata has the last word in the party, but Abhishek adds the 2022 edition to it.”

(Edited by Uttara Ramaswamy)

(A designation in this story has been updated.)


Also Read: Is Mithun Chakraborty BJP’s face for Bengal 2024? What actor’s high-profile ‘comeback’ means


 

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