Nandigram Nemesis: Why Mamata Banerjee Now Faces an Existential Crisis?

By MANISH ANAND

Mamata Banerjee exercised the destructive power of power in the past. Now, the table has turned. Suvendu Adhikari sits at helm with his grip on levers of power. The script stays same — longevity of power is ensured when the Opposition is vanquished.

New Delhi, September 18, 2026 — Bypolls in West Bengal now seem immaterial. What matters now is the old political adage and also India’s philosophical undercurrent — nothing is permanent. Mamata Banerjee, former West Bengal Chief Minister, now faces an existential political crisis. Fact of the matter suggests that she may have to seriously think of merging whatever remains of her erstwhile Trinamool Congress into the Congress. The rearview reveals that Mamata Banerjee wrote a powerful script of the destruction of her party in her own words.

In the aftermath of the 2021 West Bengal Assembly elections, Mamata Banerjee had unleashed a systematic assault on the BJP. Her victory in the state polls gave the former ruler of West Bengal a sense that power for her is permanent.

The BJP leaders were slapped with criminal cases. Some of the BJP leaders were even charged with drug-peddling. The scale of the police actions against the BJP leaders in the aftermath of 2021 was such that the party’s national office bearers literally dreaded visiting West Bengal.

“I have more than 40 cases against me. Some of the charges are beyond my comprehension,” Kailash Vijayvargiya, the BJP’s then national general secretary and in-charge for West Bengal, had told this author. He was asked why he had stopped visiting the state.

In fact, a sense prevailed that Vijayvargiya could even get arrested for non-bailable offences for which he had been charged. The national BJP leaders left the state in the hands of the West Bengal leaders, with only Union Ministers visiting the state.

Scores of the BJP leaders, including MLAs and MPs, defected to the TMC after the 2021 elections. “Those with business interests will leave the BJP, else they will face survival crisis in West Bengal,” explained a BJP leader on steady exodus of the party leaders to the TMC.

Union Minister for Home Affairs Amit Shah was closely reading the script of Mamata Banerjee. The 2024 poll outcome confirmed to the BJP leaders that West Bengal isn’t a smooth electoral ground to play straight.

Between 2024 and the 2026 Assembly elections, Shah and Suvendu Adhikari, who had been leader of the Opposition in the West Bengal, teamed up. The rest is history.

Suvendu Adhikari, son of former Union Minister Sisir Adhikari, was by all accounts the most formidable protégé of Mamata Banerjee. The 34-year Left rule met with its nemesis in Nandigram. Mamata Banerjee rode the wave of eruption of popular anger against the Left. As Mamata Banerjee emerged supreme leader of West Bengal, Suvendu Adhikari perfected the lessons of Nandigram.

Power provides tools to slay the Opposition. Mamata Banerjee exercised the destructive power of power in the past. Now, the table has turned. Suvendu Adhikari sits at helm with his grip on levers of power. The script stays same — longevity of power is ensured when the Opposition is vanquished.

(This is an opinion piece. Views expressed are the author’s own.)

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About The Author

Manish Anand

Manish Anand is a senior journalist with more than two decades of hardcore reporting on beats such as Prime Minister’s Office, Parliament, BJP, Congress, Planning Commission, NITI Aayog, and scores of Union Ministries.

His past has been with The New Indian Express, The Asian Age/Deccan Chronicle, and The Statesman.

For about 15 years, Manish was also a regular commentator and host for talks on AIR on foreign affairs.

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