The Trinamool Congress (TMC) is gearing up for the July 21 Martyrs’ Day rally in Kolkata’s Dharmatala neighborhood, the largest political event in its yearly calendar, following its stunning victory in the Lok Sabha elections in West Bengal and a sweep in the Assembly bypolls last week.
The gathering will include Mamata Banerjee, the party’s chairman and Chief Minister, giving her first public address since the election victory. Apart from the TMC’s senior leadership, including party number two Abhishek Banerjee, Samajwadi Party (SP) president Akhilesh Yadav is also set to speak at the gathering. “We have invited Akhilesh. “If the weather is good, he will come,” Banerjee said on Saturday. According to party sources, the chief minister had also invited Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Tejashwi Yadav, who is now abroad. Representatives from Uddhav Thackeray’s Shiv Sena (UBT) may also attend the event.
Before reaching at the gathering site, Akhilesh plans to visit Banerjee at her Kalighat home. “After the rally, Mamata Banerjee, Abhishek Banerjee, and Akhilesh Yadav may hold a meeting on the Opposition’s strategy for the Budget Session of Parliament (which begins on Monday),” according to a TMC leader.
For numerous years, Banerjee has used the rally podium to lay out the TMC’s strategy for the coming year. Over the years, prominent leaders from different parties have joined the TMC on the Shaheed Diwas platform. The TMC values the Shaheed Diwas stage for a variety of reasons. For example, in 2008, the TMC, riding the success of the Singur and Nandigram protests, received a significant boost when Congress politician and Banerjee’s arch rival Somen Mitra joined the party.
Throughout the week, district officials, including MLAs and MPs, began preparing for the event by organizing local marches and meeting with residents to encourage them to attend. (Express photograph by Partha Paul) Throughout the week, district officials, including MLAs and MPs, began preparing for the event by organizing local marches and meeting with residents to encourage them to attend. (Express photograph by Partha Paul)
“This year, the main focus will be on measures for rectification within the party and the preparations for the 2026 Assembly polls,” a high-ranking TMC official said. He added, “The presence of Akhilesh and other INDIA alliance leaders will be a good advertisement for the party.”
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Despite the sweeping vote results, the TMC leadership has faced criticism for recent episodes of mob justice administered by kangaroo courts to several mid-level party leaders. “Mamata Banerjee may send a strong message to these bahubali leaders who have emerged in many pockets of the state, as well as to those who are giving shelter to these bahubalis,” according to a senior TMC official.
Meanwhile, some reports say former Kolkata Mayor Shovan Chatterjee might make an unexpected appearance on the dais. Chatterjee resigned from the TMC in August 2019 and joined the BJP, but left the party after being refused a ticket for the 2021 Assembly elections. The suspicion over Chatterjee’s comeback was fueled by his meeting earlier this month with top TMC officials Kunal Ghosh and Aroop Biswas.
Following the party’s foundation in 1998, Shaheed Diwas became the TMC’s trademark yearly event, allowing the party to claim a lineage of anti-CPI(M) politics and build a narrative that it is the most steadfast political force opposing the Left in West Bengal.
The significance of Shaheed Diwas
In the 1984 Lok Sabha elections, Banerjee, then a Congress member, made headlines by beating senior CPI(M) leader Somnath Chatterjee from the Left party’s stronghold of Jadavpur. Six years later, in August 1990, she became a focal point for the Congress in the state following a brutal attack by CPI(M) workers in south Kolkata. The 1990 attack demonstrated that, whether by accident or deliberately, the CPI(M) had come to see Banerjee as a danger.
On July 21, 1993, the state Youth Congress, then led by Banerjee, organized a “Writers’ Abhijaan (March to the State Secretariat, Writers’ Building)” to demand that the voter ID be declared the only document necessary for voting. At the time, ration cards could be used as identification to vote. The Congress issued this demand to put a halt to the Left’s claimed fake voting.
The idea for the day was for Congress members to lay siege to the state secretariat. Banerjee has already proved her capacity to draw large crowds by organizing a successful Youth Congress rally at Kolkata’s Brigade Parade Ground. However, Chief Minister Jyoti Basu had previously stated that he would not allow the demonstrators to take over the state administration. When the police stopped one of the processions, a struggle broke out, and a few individuals began hurling stones. The cops used lathi-charge and then opened fire, killing 13 Congress workers.
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Beginning the next year, the Congress designated July 21 as Shaheed Diwas. When Banerjee quit the party, along with a substantial portion of the state Congress, to form the TMC, the baton of commemorating the occasion was passed to the new party.
Banerjee staged a victory rally at the Brigade Parade Ground on July 21 following her triumph in the 2011 Assembly election. It was the only occasion she staged the rally anywhere other than Esplanade East, where it is usually held.
TMC state president Subrata Bakshi broke a coconut on Monday to kick the building of the improvised stage in front of Victoria House. Three stages are being built: a 52-foot-by-24-foot main platform for party leaders, visitors, MPs, MLAs, and ministers; a 48-foot-by-24-foot second stage for party councillors; and a 40-foot-by-24-foot third stage for martyrs’ families.