Siliguri mayor Gautam Deb was appointed as the chairman of the Trinamool Congress's Darjeeling (plains) district committee on Tuesday.
Kuntal Roy, a former youth leader and the Trinamool councillor of ward 21 at the Siliguri Municipal Corporation, is the new district president.
The announcement is seen as an effort by the party to rebuild its organisational strength in the Siliguri sub-division, following its poor performance in the recent Assembly elections and ahead of the civic polls, which are scheduled to be held next year.
The polls to the Siliguri Mahakuma Parishad are expected soon after the civic polls.
In the Assembly elections, Trinamool failed to secure any of the three Assembly seats in the Darjeeling plains region — Siliguri, Matigara-Naxalbari and Phansidewa.
Deb himself lost to BJP candidate Shankar Ghosh in Siliguri.
Trinamool insiders said Deb had requested chairperson Mamata Banerjee to bring in fresh faces as office-bearers of the party. “He had also said that he did not want to continue in electoral politics. It seems that the party has listened to him and has thus brought in Kuntal Roy, while assigning him a new responsibility in the party,” said a Trinamool functionary.
Deb said he would try to deliver the responsibility.
Roy said he was confident of a comeback by Trinamool.