After an interval of eight months, TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee is back in the campaign battlefield for the upcoming state polls.

Bengal CM Banerjee picked Bankura as the venue of her first public rally after the pandemic triggered disruptions and lockdown. This is most likely due to Union Home Minister’s massive outreach in the same turf barely 20 days ago when the saffron party tried to reach out to the tribals. The schedule of the CM was preponed as she took a chopper with TMC MP Kalyan Banerjee.

TMC is now gearing up for the state polls of 2021 where its main opposition and challenge is BJP. Bankura contributes two Lok Sabha seats, both won by the BJP during the Lok Sabha elections only a year ago. As per votes polled, TMC is lagging behind in at least 14 Vidhan Sabha seats which take the Bankura district high on the priority list given its tribal & backward caste composition.

Banerjee speaking to her party cadres reminded them that TMC stands for grassroots & that is what has built its base, the workers. She also asserted that she is monitoring every party activity at each level, further stressing that she is the ‘main observer’ of every maneuver in the party.

Political strategist Prashant Kishor’s teams have been camping in every Vidhan Sabha constituency since months now, keeping every MLA’s details and submitting their reports.

Banerjee said, “The group (IPAC) is helping me. If anything happens in your area, I am the only “observer” not as a leader but as a worker.”

She further added, “There has been a systematic change in Trinamool Congress since its tie-up with IPAC which has irked few leaders within the party & the most recent one being sitting TMC MLA Mihir Goswami who has claimed, that the ‘reins of the party’ are no longer in Mamata’s hands.”

It must be noted that the Bengal CM has been engaged with steep administrative work due to the cyclone & pandemic’s twin attack in the state but now with barely a few months left for her biggest challenge, she has returned to steer ahead the party. She exclaimed, “I will work for the people, and for this party till I am alive.”

Banerjee further instructed her party workers over monitoring and surveillance, “There are few grabby, even though very few in numbers, I am asking all my workers to keep an eye. Who is visiting homes at 02:00 am; who is talking over the phones late at night. Keep all the information. Keep information about those taking their cars out late at night without reason for work.”

Without naming BJP, the CM continued, “those who want to buy Bengal with money, should know that Bengal does not bow before money”. It is perhaps in anticipation of horse-trading before the upcoming polls, a situation witnessed in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka during the state polls.

The differences between West Bengal Minister Suvendu Adhikari and TMC are out in the open when he took out a separate rally from the party in Nandigram. Being a popular face in “jangalmahal” he has remained absent from the CM’s Bankura tour while carrying on his schedule elsewhere. Recently, Dilip Ghosh, had tried to pull Chatradhar Mahato from TMC into BJP, which makes the presence of Mamata Banerjee in the campaigning all the more demanding.