4 min readNew DelhiJul 30, 2026 04:23 PM IST
First published on: Jul 30, 2026 at 04:18 PM IST
A banter between senior Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and Trinamool Congress MP Kalyan Banerjee in the Parliament complex on Thursday captured how political necessities have led to breakaways and reunions.
Banerjee, MP from West Bengal’s Sreerampur and one of the eight Trinamool Lok Sabha members still backing party chief Mamata Banerjee, was staging a protest at Parliament with a poster worn around his neck. On the poster were photographs of 20 rebel MPs, who left the Trinamool Congress, joined the little-known Nationalist Citizens Party of India and sided with the BJP-led NDA. The poster read, “Lok Sabha mein Bangal ka 20 gaddar (meaning 20 traitors from Bengal in Lok Sabha).”
Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, MP from Kerala’s Wayanad, and a few other Congress MPs met Banerjee outside the Makar Dwar of Parliament. She said with a smile that some of the rebel MPs were with the Congress before switching to the Trinamool, and have now moved to NCPI. Banerjee replied that some Congress leaders switched to the Trinamool Congress in 2014 because the Grand Old Party had little presence in Bengal. He also stressed that these leaders won the Lok Sabha election on a Trinamool ticket.
#WATCH | Delhi: While suspended TMC MP Kalyan Banerjee was protesting outside Makar Dwar on TMC MPs Merger to NCPI, Congress MP Priyanka Gandhi Vadra approached him and said “you took them from Congress to TMC” to which Kalyan Banerjee replied that Mamata Banerjee was thrown out… pic.twitter.com/WIltyZiwUr
— ANI (@ANI) July 30, 2026
Independent MP Rajesh Ranjan, better known as Pappu Yadav, said all of them were with the Congress at one point. “I was a Congress person too. I was a vice-president of the Youth Congress,” Banerjee shot back. “You drove Didi (Mamata Banerjee) out of the Congress. Let’s talk about that. … Otherwise, the status of the Congress would not have been this,” the Trinamool leader said.
Priyanka Gandhi said former PM and her father, Rajiv Gandhi, always respected ‘Didi’. “Yes, Rajiv ji had given love and respect to Didi. But later, the Congress joined hands with the CPM (which was in power in West Bengal then). But our fight was against the CPM,” Banerjee said. He added that at the time, Congress stalwarts Pranab Mukherjee and Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi were among those in favour of joining hands with the CPM, but Mamata Banerjee and her followers were bent on fighting the Left party. “When Didi said this, she was driven out of the party (Congress),” the Trinamool MP said. At this, Yadav told him that Congress is now fully backing ‘Didi’; the Trinamool leader acknowledged this.
Mamata Banerjee with Sonia Gandhi after her big defeat in Bengal polls. File
The Congress-Trinamool story
Mamata Banerjee, former Bengal Chief Minister, started her political career with the Congress and gained popularity as a firebrand. In the 1984 general election, Banerjee was elected to the Lok Sabha for the first time after she defeated Left veteran Somnath Chatterjee in Jadavpur.
Differences emerged between Banerjee and others in the Congress over the party’s stand towards the Left. Banerjee felt the Congress had a soft stance towards the Left, which was then in power in Bengal. Eventually, in 1998, Banerjee formed the All India Trinamool Congress. Later, she joined the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government as Railways Minister.
A decade later, Trinamool became a part of the Congress-led UPA government and returned as Railway Minister, before walking out of the coalition in 2012 over a fuel price hike and FDI in retail. Following the BJP’s return to power, Congress and Trinamool buried differences and joined forces under the INDIA bloc. In Bengal, however, the parties continued to target each other as the Congress took on the ruling Trinamool. With the BJP defeating Trinamool in Bengal polls this year, followed by a meltdown in its ranks, the Mamata Banerjee-led party has sought the Congress’s support, underlining how political necessity dictates equations. The two parties, which were locked in a tussle within the INDIA bloc ahead of the Bengal polls, are now aligned on key issues as they take on the BJP both inside and outside the House.
