A calm and tactful Mamata Banerjee to focus on “honesty among partymen” and “no-EVM” at Martyrs’ Day programme today

The Martyrs’ Day programme on July 21 in Kolkata’s Esplanade will be quite different this time as far as the party chief Mamata Banerjee’s message is concerned, say a section of Trinamool Congress insiders.

For the past couple of months – since the party’s unexpectedly poor show in the Lok Sabha polls – Banerjee has been consciously working on being tactful and calm, rather than losing her cool in public meetings. According to some, her conscious decision to stay calm publicly is following the advice of poll strategist Prashant Kishor, who has been appointed by the Trinamool Congress with an eye on the 2021 Assembly elections.

Also, the message the party wants to impart at the Martyrs’ Day meeting is that “Trinamool Congress means business” and “Mamata Banerjee means business”. No wonder then, the main tagline for the meeting – displayed in big, bold letters in Bengali – has been “bring back democracy/ Not EVM, give us ballots”. The Trinamool Congress has been fighting for bringing back the ballot paper for elections for several years now, but despite pleading before the Election Commission and the Supreme Court, the electronic voting machines (EVMs) have not been replaced by ballot papers.

Party insiders say that the Trinamool Congress will not let this issue go out of focus, and work towards bringing back ballot papers for the 2021 Assembly polls in Bengal. A steady and serious build-up is necessary, even if it eventually doesn’t happen, says a Trinamool Congress insider.

The demands won’t be all sound and fury, but careful strategies implemented seriously in the coming days. “Only steps for which people take the Trinamool Congress seriously are being worked on,” said a party insider.

There are conscious efforts at projecting a clean image for the Trinamool Congress, for which Banerjee has openly told her party colleagues to “return cut-money” where they have taken share of funds meant for the people under various government schemes. This has already had the desired impact.

Banerjee has always managed to maintain her clean image, but many leaders around her are perceived to be dishonest, and there is a conscious strategising to cleanse the party from this perspective.

Under this backdrop, a more tactful and calm Mamata Banerjee who means business, who focuses on work, results, honesty and who fights for democracy and people’s rights will be back into the focus, rather than talking about the party’s “achievements” since coming into power in 2011.