Yesterday felt like one of those days when the ground shifts under your feet in Bengal politics. Mamata Banerjee, the woman who built the Trinamool Congress from scratch nearly three decades ago, woke up to find her party’s name and that familiar grass-and-twin-flowers symbol locked away by the Election Commission. Both her faction and the rebel group led by Ritabrata Banerjee (with Arup Roy in the mix) were barred from using “All India Trinamool Congress” or the old symbol for the upcoming bypolls in Nandigram and Rejinagar on October 6.

The Commission then handed out temporary labels. Mamata’s side is now “Mamata All India Trinamool Congress” with a football player as its symbol. The other side got “Democratic Trinamool Congress” and an envelope. Temporary, they say, until the bigger fight over who is the real Trinamool gets settled. But for a party that has lived and breathed that twin-flower logo since Mamata herself sketched it back in 1998, it stings. She called it a black day for democracy—unconstitutional, biased, the interests of another political party being served. She made it clear they only submitted alternative names and symbols because the bypoll process was already rolling. They do not accept this as final. They will fight to get the original back.

You could hear the hurt in her voice at that press conference in Kalighat. She accused the rebel faction of betraying the “mother” of the party by letting the symbol be taken. “If anyone really respected the Trinamool Congress, they would not insult its mother like this by snatching away the symbol and make it an orphan,” she said. For her, this is personal. The party was her creation after she walked out of the Congress all those years ago. Losing the name and the mark that voters have associated with her for so long feels like someone is trying to erase that history.

But politics rarely hands you pure losses. Almost as soon as the freeze order came, support started arriving from unexpected corners. Rahul Gandhi, Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, stepped in. The two have never exactly been close—frosty would be putting it mildly over the years—but he framed this as bigger than one party or one leader. He said the battle is not Mamata’s alone. It is the battle for every political party and every voter who wants free and impartial elections. He pointed to a pattern he sees: parties being broken, symbols snatched, the same treatment earlier given to others. Congress leaders across the board echoed the same line.

Then came the Cockroach Janta Party, the young, satirical outfit that has been making noise online and on the streets. Their co-convenor Saurav Das called the Election Commission a government stooge and said the time for accountability is coming. The CJP handle backed him up. Mamata has shown warmth toward the group before; now the sympathy was flowing the other way. In a season where opposition parties are looking for common ground, these gestures matter.

The bypolls themselves turned messier still. Mamata’s candidate in Nandigram, Sanchita Pradhan Dey, withdrew her nomination. Suddenly her faction had no one on the ballot there. So she announced support for the Congress candidate, calling it a decision for the greater interest of the country and the INDIA alliance. She described Congress as a natural ally—words that carry their own history, given how she once left that party. For Rejinagar she said she would decide later. Nandigram, of course, is no ordinary seat. It is the place that once helped her rise against the Left. Now it is testing her all over again, with Suvendu Adhikari’s shadow still large in the background.

This whole episode did not appear out of nowhere. After the Trinamool’s heavy defeat in the 2026 Assembly elections, the party fractured. Most of the MLAs drifted toward the Ritabrata camp. Organisational elections, claims of majority, counter-claims of loyalty to the founder—everything went into the Commission’s files under the Election Symbols Order. The interim freeze is the result. Both sides have been recognised as political parties in West Bengal, Meghalaya and Tripura for now, but the real prize—the original name and the grass-and-flowers mark—remains unresolved. Mamata’s side has already moved the Supreme Court.

What does it all mean on the ground? For ordinary workers and voters who have waved the twin-flower flag for years, the sudden change is confusing. Campaign material, wall writings, the emotional attachment to a symbol that stood for “Maa, Maati, Maanush”—all of that has to be rethought overnight. The football player and the envelope will have to do the heavy lifting for these two seats. Whether that carries any weight in Nandigram or Rejinagar is something only the October 6 results will tell.

Mamata has been through worse. She has fought the Left, taken on the Centre, rebuilt after setbacks. She is promising to bounce back stronger and keep touring the districts. The rebels insist they are the ones who saved the symbol from disgrace and will ultimately keep it. Congress is offering public solidarity while quietly testing how far the new understanding can go. CJP is adding its own sharp voice from the margins.

In the end, this is less about one bypoll and more about what happens when a party that was almost synonymous with one person starts to crack under pressure. The Election Commission has drawn a temporary line. The courts will hear the arguments. The voters will deliver their own verdict. For now, Mamata Banerjee stands without the name and symbol she carried for 28 years, but she is not standing alone. Congress has spoken up. CJP has extended sympathy. And she herself is already talking about the next fight.

That is the picture as it stands today in Kolkata. Politics in Bengal has rarely been gentle. This week it simply reminded everyone how quickly the ground can move.

Sources:
The Hindu, India Today, Mint, Telegraph India, Times of India, NDTV, Economic Times, The Week (reports dated 17–19 September 2026).

@⁨Rohit Manral⁩