Calcutta, Nov. 19: The fledgling Congress-Trinamul Congress relationship in Bengal received a body blow today with Priya Ranjan Das Munshi refusing to withdraw the Congress candidate for a byelection.

Hamidul Rahaman will ensure a three-cornered contest in Islampur, where Trinamul has already fielded a candidate. The CPM holds the seat, but the death of its MLA necessitated the election.

“There is no understanding with Mamata Banerjee this time; our candidate will be in the fray,” the information and broadcasting minister said during a programme to observe Indira Gandhi’s birth anniversary.

He hastened to add that relations with Trinamul, friendly since the parties stood by each other for the September bypolls to three Lok Sabha seats and an Assembly constituency, would remain “intact”, but that is unlikely.

A Trinamul leader made it clear that Islampur would make it impossible for the parties to rally together “over Singur” — where opposition to the government’s land acquisition for a Tata Motors factory has been a favourite issue for Trinamul and sections of the Congress — and “other issues”.

A Mamata aide said: “Didi is hurt.”

The Trinamul chief slammed the Congress again — after a few months’ break — for making elections easier for the CPM. “The Congress is not serious enough to fight the communists in Bengal,” Mamata said tonight.

Ironically, Das Munshi was the architect of the parties’ coming together despite opposition from sections within the Congress. But the relations started going downhill since Abdul Karim Chowdhury, the Trinamul candidate for Islampur, said in Calcutta last week that he lost the last election because of “back-stabbing by Priyada and his wife Deepa”.

The Congress and Trinamul had fought the May polls separately.

The state Congress had earlier announced that it might back Trinamul in Islampur, but Das Munshi scuttled any such move. “He had a major say as it falls in his district, North Dinajpur,” said state Congress working president Pradip Bhattacharya.

However, those opposed to Das Munshi in the Congress said a section of the North Dinajpur unit led by district secretary Gautam Gupta is backing Trinamul in the December 4 bypoll.