Defeat for jora phul (twin flowers) arrived at the peak of the merciless summer with the unprecedented blooming of the lotus on May 4.
It is still May, but the three-term Trinamool Congress hegemony seems to be coming apart with the velocity of a house of cards even before the onset of monsoon.
The out-of-power Trinamool ecosystem seems to be imploding from 15 years of pent-up internal dissent and an acute, post-verdict panic. Discordant voices from every corner of its ecosystem tell the story of an unprecedented mutiny.
At least 18 heavyweights — a volatile mix of sitting and former MPs, MLAs and ministers — have already broken ranks to publicly criticise the party’s style of functioning. Behind them stands a procession of a dozen-odd spokespersons, over 100 municipal councillors and countless panchayat functionaries questioning — on or off-record — if the party will even exist on paper by next summer (see chart).
The blueprint for this disaster allegedly traces directly to the spreadsheet-driven hubris of Abhishek Banerjee, Mamata Banerjee's nephew and heir apparent before she was dethroned by her former protégé Suvendu Adhikari.
Suvendu left for the BJP in December 2020 largely because of his inability to come to terms with being overlooked for succession.
"Under the direct patronage of Bhaipo (Abhishek), the party’s soul was outsourced to corporate mercenaries from I-PAC. Mass leaders, street-hardened veterans found themselves placed under the dictatorial supervision of corrupt data analysts and local police chiefs," said a party veteran.
"Abhishek and I-PAC dropped 74 sitting MLAs to bring in new faces, some with questionable credibility, and relocate 15 others. Of the 74 replacements, 51 lost. Among the 15 relocated MLAs, only three won. That's how great their decisions were," he added.
Today, that corporate apparatus has evaporated. Abhishek has effectively gone into post-defeat disappearance, leaving a defenseless grassroots cadre to face the music.
"For a leadership that built its empire on institutionalised corruption, criminalisation, and the total politicisation of everything from sports to entertainment, the reality of life without state protection has triggered absolute terror," said one of the 74 dropped MLAs.
Lacking an ideological anchor — the party formed in 1998 as a breakaway from the Congress solely to oust the CPM — its flight toward self-preservation has hit tsunami speeds.
In North 24-Parganas, for instance, the exit gates are broken.
Scores of councillors, frantic to secure immunity from pending corruption cases, are resigning en masse to surrender to the BJP.
When Jahangir Khan quietly withdrew from the Falta repoll without informing the high command, Abhishek shrugged it off as "his personal decision". The rank and file took the hint: the Trinamool leadership has neither the muscle nor the appetite to enforce discipline or offer protection.
The scramble for rehabilitation has now reached near-comic proportions. Sources in Trinamool said seven MLAs from Malda and Murshidabad are camped outside the Congress doors in Delhi, while two MPs are directly approaching Rahul Gandhi. In Barasat, Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar has quit the party's post. The activities of Ritabrata Banerjee of Uluberia Purba and Sandipan Saha of Entally — or even Kunal Ghosh of Beleghata — hardly inspire confidence.
Old defectors like Manas Bhunia are busy drafting flattering overtures to Suvendu in the name of district brotherhood. Erstwhile high-fliers like Shashi Panja and Atin Ghosh have gone missing in action.
Yet, inside 30B Harish Chatterjee Street, the denial remains absolute. Former chief minister Mamata refuses to acknowledge defeat, rejects any criticism of her nephew, and comes on "Facebook live" instead of hitting the streets to rebuild the party. At 71, she is perhaps no longer the militant streetfighter that her party desperately needs her to be.
When she ordered her party's newly elected MLAs to give Abhishek a standing ovation on May 6, the subsequent late-night phone logs of multiple seniors leaked a fury suggesting the ground is not just loose — it is shaking.
Political scientists argue that the systemic collapse is the inevitable reckoning of a party built without a foundational ideology.
"Trinamool started as an alternative to the Congress in Bengal, with the sole aim of felling the Left, as a big tent party where everybody with that goal came together, placing ideology aside," political scientist Subhamoy Maitra argued. "Consequently, they stayed together from a relatively compromising standpoint... but by doing this, their internal cohesion was destroyed over 15 years in power.... Out of power, such a house-of-cards situation was an inevitability."
Maitra said the crisis is compounded by a profound, structural paralysis at the absolute top of the pyramid — the family gridlock that prevents the very possibility of survival architecture.
"The ease with which the BJP allowed Narendra Modi to rise by shutting its eyes to L.K. Advani, Mamata cannot do that with Abhishek," Maitra observed.