‘Politics of loot’ cry in former Maoist hotbed of Bengal’s Jangalmahal, where TMC is its own enemy
Telegraph | 17 April 2026
Metalled thoroughfares have replaced the murram roads in the erstwhile Maoist hotbed of Lalgarh, Dalilpur Chowk, around 170 km west of Kolkata.
Back in 2008, it was at a nondescript road intersection here that the People's Committee Against Police Atrocities (PCAPA), the thinly armed militia of the CPI (Maoist), set up their final roadblock to stop police and central forces from advancing any further into the forest-covered region, with gun-toting men providing them cover in daylight.
A perfect point of ambush, paramilitary troops carried out several critical anti-Maoist operations around this place to flush out the guerrillas and restore law and order in the so-called "liberated zone".
Some 17 years later, the point is hardly recognisable, a mark of the development work carried out during the early years of Trinamool rule after it stormed to power in Bengal in 2011.
Yet, sitting under the passenger shade at one corner of the intersection, Pradipta (name changed on request), a Trinamool worker, wore a glum look.
"It is difficult to see things falling apart," he said, attributing the party's "slide" in the area to factional fights germinating from coteries of local leadership.
The Jhargram Assembly segment, of which Lalgarh is part, in the tribal belt of Jangalmahal – local term for the forest-covered central Bengal region – has remained in the TMC’s grip since 2011.
That dominance, according to insiders like Pradipta, faces its greatest challenge in a decade with the BJP making sharp inroads.
"Look at the development activities in the region undertaken by the Mamata Banerjee administration. The primary hospital in Lalgarh now has 30 beds, with good doctors attending patients, seats at the nursing college are full, and thanks to the bridge on the Kangsabati river, Lalgarh is no longer a remote hamlet," Pradipta said, listing an ITI, polytechnic, a DEd college for tribals and three “model schools” built by the government.
"Yet all of that seems to be coming to nought, simply because some local leaders formed groups by ignoring and isolating the vast majority of dedicated party workers and attracting people's disillusionment. What's baffling is that the party's top leadership chose to overlook it," he said.
The Trinamool has shifted its Jhargram MLA, Birbaha Hansda, to the adjacent Binpur seat, replacing her with Mangal Soren, a law officer at Sadhu Ramchand Murmu University. Soren had unsuccessfully contested the 2004 Lok Sabha polls on a ticket from the JMM, Jharkhand’s ruling party.
Hansda, a former actor in Santhali films, served as a minister in the TMC government and is considered close to the party chief, Mamata Banerjee.
Hansda’s organisational leadership in Jhargram, though, has been repeatedly questioned by a section of TMC workers, apparently prompting them to go inactive or switch camps.
To tackle the situation, the Trinamool has reactivated Chhatradhar Mahata, a former PCAPA leader who spent nearly 13 years in prison in two phases for his alleged involvement in Maoist violence.
Mahata had played an active role in helping the TMC recover from its 2019 Lok Sabha setbacks in Jangalmahal, where the BJP had won Jhargram and most adjoining seats. However, he was seen distancing himself from organisational activities after the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
"I have no hesitation in saying that there has been politics of loot in Jhargram over the past few years,” Mahata said. “Had 60 per cent of the funds allotted by the state government reached the people, the BJP would not have found a footing here. I also think the party's top leadership failed to effectively monitor the use of funds.
"I am back because the TMC leadership requested me,” he added. “I will do my bit to restore equilibrium within the organisation here, but I hope it is not too late.”
TMC's Jhargram Assembly election committee chairperson Prasun Sarangi asserted that the state government’s development work over the years will trump other aspects.
"The massive development that happened in Lalgarh is strongly visible. The thing is, the TMC's organisation has also grown manifold and some people are aggrieved,” he admitted. “But, I think people trust chief minister Mamata Banerjee, and they will vote for the TMC's development work.”
The party, he said, was working to overcome whatever organisational weaknesses it has ahead of the polls.
The BJP thinks the "disgust" that people of Jhargram had with the CPM 15 years ago is going to dominate election sentiments against the Trinamool this time.
Debasish Banerjee, who carried the TMC's mantle in Lalgarh till 2023, is now president of one of the BJP's mandals.
"The BJP has done nothing to gain people's trust in the area so far,” he said. “It's just that there's no love lost between the TMC and the people here, and the voters see us as the only viable alternative. That's exactly what happened with the Left in 2011 here.”
Banerjee said he continues to have 33 criminal cases against his name, all of which the erstwhile Left Front government had slapped on him during the days of Maoist violence.
"That was the act of a vindictive government. But what has the TMC done? It never even gave us financial assistance to fight such a huge number of cases, let alone withdraw them," he said.
The Jhargram region will vote in the first phase of the Bengal Assembly election, on April 23.