Mausam's return to Congress reopens Malda math exposes INDIA bloc fault lines in Bengal

Kolkata, Jan 3 (PTI) With the West Bengal Assembly elections a few months away, TMC MP Mausam Benazir Noor's return to the Congress has reopened Malda's political arithmetic, turning a politically settled district into a live variable that revives triangular-contest risks, unsettles minority equations, and tests whether the TMC's 2021 consolidation can withstand churn.
    Noor's political homecoming has exposed a structural contradiction shaping Bengal politics ahead of 2026, underscoring a reality the INDIA bloc cannot ignore: unity in Delhi, fragmentation in the state, where the TMC is fighting simultaneous battles against the BJP and the Left-Congress alliance.
    Seven years after crossing over from the Congress to the TMC, the Rajya Sabha MP's rejoining the grand old party in New Delhi on Saturday has come at a politically loaded moment.
    The Congress is searching for revival in districts where it was once dominant, the TMC is guarding a hard-won consolidation among minorities, and the BJP continues to eye vote-splits that helped it crack the Malda North seat in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
    For the TMC, it is the timing, and not the departure, that causes discomfort.
    In the 2021 Assembly elections, the party swept eight of Malda's 12 seats with a 53 per cent vote share, reducing the Congress to 8.8 per cent from 33 per cent in 2016, while the Left-Congress alliance drew a blank. That verdict allowed the ruling party to project Malda as a post-Congress district. Mausam's exit challenges that narrative, at least at the margins.
    "This is not about grievance; it is about legacy," Mausam said after rejoining the Congress, repeatedly underlining family consensus and the political lineage of her uncle, former Union minister and Congress stalwart ABA Ghani Khan Choudhury.
    She avoided criticism of Mamata Banerjee, even calling her "Mamata didi", and made it clear that her political fight would be aimed at the BJP, which she described as the Congress's principal adversary.
    The Congress, eager to signal momentum, framed the move as a beginning rather than a culmination.
    Senior leader Jairam Ramesh said the party's focus was organisational rebuilding first, alliances later. State Congress chief Subhankar Sarkar went a step further, describing Mausam's return as a "trailer".
    The TMC, however, dismissed the switch as politically inconsequential.
    Party MP Sougata Roy termed it "political betrayal", arguing that despite her 2019 Lok Sabha defeat, the party had elevated Mausam to the Rajya Sabha and given her organisational roles.
    "Her tenure was nearing its end. What more could we have given?" he asked, asserting that the Congress remained a "spent force" in West Bengal.
    Privately, TMC leaders concede surprise rather than alarm. "There was no hint," said a Lok Sabha MP, noting that Mausam had recently been assigned Assembly-level coordination work.
    The unease has been sharpened by the optics, reviving the old allegation that the Congress is attempting to poach INDIA allies, a charge the Congress counters by recalling the TMC's induction of Sagardighi MLA Byron Biswas after a by-poll win in 2023.
    For the BJP, Mausam's move is less about her personal following and more about arithmetic.
    In 2019, she lost Malda North as the TMC candidate to BJP MP Khagen Murmu, a result widely attributed to a split in traditional Congress votes. In 2024, when the TMC fielded a former IPS officer instead, the BJP retained the seat.
    A revived Congress presence, even if modest, potentially reopens the space for triangular contests, the BJP's preferred terrain.
    Political analysts caution against overstating the immediate impact. "The Congress has to convert symbolism into structure," said a Kolkata-based observer.
"Mausam brings recall and lineage, but the district's minority consolidation moved decisively to the TMC in 2021. The question is whether the Congress can rebuild booth-level capacity fast enough to matter in 2026."
    Yet, Malda's politics has a longer memory.
    The Ghani Khan Choudhury name still resonates, and with Mausam's cousin Isha Khan Choudhury, the lone Congress MP from the state, anchoring the family within the Congress, the party hopes to stitch together a narrative of return and relevance.
    For the TMC, the counter-strategy is to ring-fence its minority base while avoiding a public spat with a national ally.
    The party insists its 2021 mandate -- BJP at 32 per cent and four seats, and Congress marginalized -- remains the baseline.
    For the Congress, the wager is that anti-incumbency, local leadership reunification and a sharper BJP-versus-Congress framing can loosen the TMC's grip.
    Whether Mausam Benazir Noor's switch becomes a footnote or a fault line will depend less on nostalgia than on numbers.
    As West Bengal inches toward 2026, Malda has re-entered the conversation -- not as a settled district, but as a reminder that alliances, like loyalties, are most fragile on the eve of elections.

(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)