TMC Internal Rebellion Threatens Party Unity and Could Strengthen NDA's Parliamentary Position

The Trinamool Congress, which governed West Bengal for 15 years under Mamata Banerjee, is facing its worst internal crisis since its founding in 1998, triggered by a crushing defeat in the May 2026 state assembly elections that reduced its tally from 215 to 80 seats. The rebellion began in the state legislature when 58 of the party's 80 MLAs defied the official leadership and installed their own Leader of the Opposition; it then spread to Parliament, with rebel Lok Sabha MP Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar claiming the backing of nearly 20 MPs who have written to the Speaker seeking to form a separate bloc aligned with the BJP-led NDA. Three Rajya Sabha MPs — Sukhendu Sekhar Ray, Sushmita Dev, and Prakash Chik Baraik — have resigned from both the party and the upper house this week, while the rebel Lok Sabha faction has announced it will formally press its claim for recognition as the 'real TMC' parliamentary group. TMC loyalists, including Kalyan Banerjee and Kirti Azad, have accused the rebels of siding with the BJP and invoked anti-defection law, with MP Mahua Moitra arguing that the 91st Constitutional Amendment removed the provision for a parliamentary split, meaning rebels would need to formally merge with another party. Amid the turmoil, Mamata Banerjee and her nephew Abhishek Banerjee held back-to-back meetings with Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi, fuelling speculation about a possible TMC-Congress rapprochement, though both parties denied any merger plans. Political analysts attribute the rapid unravelling to the TMC's structural dependence on Banerjee's personal charisma and state patronage rather than ideological foundations, a vulnerability now exposed by the loss of power and the BJP's ability to offer an alternative centre of resources and protection to defecting leaders.