Kolkata | Even as the Congress high command held back-to-back meetings with Mamata Banerjee in New Delhi, growing speculation over a possible rapprochement or even a merger between the grand old party and the TMC has exposed fault lines within the Congress' West Bengal unit.
While senior Congress leaders in Delhi remained tight-lipped about the discussions, the possibility of accommodating Mamata Banerjee amid an internal crisis in the TMC has triggered sharply divergent reactions within the grand old party's state leadership.
At the centre of the debate is a politically sensitive question: if the Congress leadership moves closer to Mamata Banerjee, will Bengal Congress workers -- many of whom have spent years opposing the TMC -- accept her as one of their own?
The question gained urgency after Mamata Banerjee met Congress Parliamentary Party chairperson Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday, followed by a meeting between Abhishek Banerjee and Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday.
The two rounds of talks fuelled intense political speculation, particularly against the backdrop of the unprecedented split within the TMC that saw a majority of its MLAs rally behind the rebel camp led by Leader of Opposition Ritabrata Banerjee and a large section of its Lok Sabha MPs rally behind Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar.
Sources in both parties acknowledged that discussions on the future of anti-BJP politics in Bengal and the changing political situation in the state figured in the conversations, though neither side officially confirmed reports of merger talks.
Within the Bengal Congress, however, resistance is already visible.
A section of state leaders believes that embracing Mamata Banerjee now would burden the Congress with the political baggage of 15 years of alleged corruption, misgovernance and organisational erosion under TMC rule.
Veteran Congress leaders Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury and Abdul Mannan have emerged as the most vocal opponents of any such move.
"I have full faith in the Congress leadership. No alliance with Mamata Banerjee. If you mix drainage water with clean water, it will pollute the clean water too," Mannan said.
Chowdhury, former state Congress president and bitter critic of Banerjee, struck an even sharper note.
"The same Mamata Banerjee who once broke the Congress, ensuring Congress was wiped out from Bengal, now finds herself compelled to seek the support of the Gandhi family. One has to face the consequences of one's political actions," he said.
State Congress president Shubhankar Sarkar adopted a more calibrated position, making it clear that anyone seeking to join the party would first have to accept Rahul Gandhi's leadership.
"Anyone who accepts Rahul Gandhi as the future prime minister of the country and the leader of the Congress and the opposition is welcome in the party," Sarkar said.
At the same time, he appeared to draw a distinction between Mamata Banerjee and those facing allegations of corruption.
"If someone is trying to take shelter under the Congress umbrella merely to escape corruption charges, the doors are not open for them," he said in an apparent reference to sections of the TMC leadership.
The developments come at a time when the political ground beneath the TMC continues to shift rapidly.
The party has already suffered a major split in both the Assembly and Parliament, with rebel legislators claiming the support of 58 MLAs who defied the party leadership and backed Ritabrata Banerjee as Leader of the Opposition instead of the party's official nominee, Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay.
Twenty rebel TMC MPs have already informed Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla about the formation of a separate parliamentary bloc under the leadership of Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar and pledged support to the NDA.
The rebellion has significantly weakened Mamata Banerjee's organisational hold and triggered fresh speculation about the future political course of the faction still loyal to her.
Political observers note that the symbolism of the Delhi meetings is difficult to ignore.
For decades, Mamata Banerjee defined her politics through opposition to the Congress leadership after breaking away to form the Trinamool Congress in 1998.
Today, as the party she built confronts an existential challenge, the Congress has unexpectedly re-emerged as a possible political refuge -- or at least a negotiating table.
Whether the conversations in Delhi ultimately lead to a formal political arrangement remains uncertain.
But even before any decision is taken, the debate has already revealed a reality confronting both sides: while the Congress high command may be willing to explore new equations in a dramatically altered Bengal, the party's state unit is far from convinced that reconciliation with Mamata Banerjee is either politically necessary or electorally desirable.
For now, the discussions in Delhi may have opened a door. In Bengal, however, many Congress leaders appear determined to keep a hand firmly on the latch.
New Delhi | Amid rumours of a possible merger of the Trinamool Congress (TMC) with the Congress, sources from the Mamata Banerjee-led party dismissed the reports on Wednesday, stating there was no such plan.
Dismissing the reports, a senior TMC leader called them "baseless".
"We have no such information. This is baseless," a senior TMC leader told PTI.
Speculation about a possible merger gained ground following a meeting between TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee and former Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday, which came a day after the Congress released a photograph of the two leaders hugging at the INDIA bloc meeting.
While both the parties did not disclose details of the meeting between the two veteran leaders, the sources said Banerjee stressed opposition unity, and asserted that the INDIA bloc should work together to take on the BJP regarding various public issues.
On Wednesday, TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee met the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi.
Sources said the Rahul-Abhishek meeting was being seen as part of the ongoing engagement between the Congress and the TMC following discussions at the INDIA bloc meeting held in Delhi earlier this week.
While details of the meeting were not immediately available, the development occurred when the TMC is facing internal rebellion following its defeat in the recent West Bengal Assembly elections.
At the INDIA bloc meeting on Monday, opposition leaders emphasised the need for greater coordination and unity among alliance partners to challenge the BJP.
Banerjee had urged alliance constituents to set aside differences and work together on public issues.
Banerjee formed the TMC in 1998 after breaking away from the Congress.
The party later grew into West Bengal's dominant political force, ending the Left Front's 34-year rule in the state in 2011.
Troubles have mounted for the TMC since the party's election defeat last month and the subsequent rebellion within the party's legislature wing. Last week, more than two-thirds of the party's MLAs -- 58 of its 80 legislators -- broke away from the official TMC legislature party and secured recognition as the principal opposition bloc in the Assembly under expelled MLA Ritabrata Banerjee.
The crisis reached Delhi last week, with rebel MPs led by Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar claiming support from over 20 Lok Sabha MPs who want to break away.
