The announcement of Rajya Sabha bypolls for three seats in West Bengal on Monday may have set a deadline-of-sorts for the Election Commission of India (ECI) to decide on rival claims for the Trinamool Congress party name and symbol after both factions — one led by Ritabrata Banerjee and another by Mamata Banerjee — laid claim to being the real party.
The July 24 by-elections were triggered by the resignations of Sukhendu Sekhar Ray, Sushmita Dev and Prakash Chik Baraik last month after the TMC lost the assembly elections in West Bengal.
Nominations for the three seats will have to be filed by July 14. If both factions nominate separate candidates, ECI will have to take a call on who is the TMC candidate by that date, or allot temporary identities to both groups while keeping the TMC name in abeyance.
Why ECI may have to take call on ‘real’ TMC
Separately, a little-known form 22A — using which a party appoints its authorised agent to verify lawmaker ballots for the Rajya Sabha polls — might also precipitate matters. If both factions file separate forms, ECI will have to take a call before the elections.
“From what I can see, this is heading the way of a freeze,” said former chief election commissioner SY Quraishi, predicting that ECI will lock the actual TMC name and twin-flower symbol until it delivers a final verdict, and allot temporary identities to both factions in the interim — “for example, TMC-A and TMC-B.”
Such an arrangement, he noted, would let both camps contest the three Rajya Sabha seats under distinct, ECI-assigned labels while the larger question of which faction constitutes the “real” TMC remains pending.
The Bharatiya Janata Party, which holds 207 of the 294 seats in the West Bengal assembly, is expected to win all three seats.
The developments came on a day the Mamata Banerjee faction told ECI that it is the real TMC. Senior TMC MP Kalyan Banerjee, who represented the party before poll officials in Delhi, said “the party’s submission asserted the National Working Committee’s tenure runs till 2027”, countering the rebel camp’s claim that it had already lapsed. He called the breakaway group “completely dishonest,” alleging it had illegally taken over the party office with the backing of the state’s chief minister and police.
The filing came in response to an ECI directive issued on July 2, asking both Mamata Banerjee and Bengal Leader of the Opposition Ritabrata Banerjee to furnish supporting documents on their rival claims over the party’s organisational structure, authorised signatories and symbol, by 5.30 pm on July 6.
Ritabrata Banerjee rejected the charge, saying, “We are the real TMC,” and accused the Mamata Banerjee camp of fostering “the cult of the individual and dynastic politics.” He claimed the backing of more than two-thirds of the party’s 80 MLAs in Bengal, along with several former ministers, councillors and Zila Parishad members. Arup Roy, who heads the rebel camp’s newly constituted NWC, said his side had “submitted all paperwork from its June 22 session”.
“CEC Gyanesh Kumar and the commission heard both delegations and assured them the matter would be examined, with a personal hearing possible if requested before a decision is made on whether the rift amounts to a formal split,” said a senior ECI official.
How party ownership is decided
The Election Symbols Order, 1968, lays down three tests to determine the ownership of a party: Aims and objects, party constitution, and majority. “The majority test, measuring organisational and legislative strength, is likely to prove decisive, though a legislative majority alone is not considered conclusive on its own,” added the official quoted above.
If the ECI has not ruled by July 14, both factions could file rival nominees under the TMC ticket for the same three Rajya Sabha seats, forcing returning officers to reject one or both sets of papers and likely pushing the dispute into court.For nomination, a candidate needs at least 10 legislators or 10% of the electoral college (state assembly) as proposers – which means both factions have the strength to field candidates.
In the case of the Shiv Sena vertical split in 2022, ECI froze the undivided party’s symbol, allotted temporary identities for an interim bypoll held on November 3, 2022 in Andheri East assembly constituency (Mumbai), necessitated by the death of sitting MLA Ramesh Latke, and eventually awarded the name and symbol to the Eknath Shinde-led faction about four months later on February 17, 2023.
