Many have toiled hard under her leadership and they are now likely to be rewarded.
AMIT MITRA
Amit Mitra is the secretary-general to the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry, and Mamata Banerjee’s poster boy from Delhi who is supposed to help usher into West Bengal the much needed big-ticket investments from across the country. Having defeated the incumbent finance minister, Asim Dasgupta, he is described as the replacement in the government. The 63-year-old alumnus of Calcutta Boys School, he fought the polls on the plank of the absence of development, a ruined higher education system under the Left and, of course, the abysmal state of the state exchequer.
MUKUL ROY
The All India general secretary of the TMC, Mukul Roy has often been called Mamata Banerjee’s Man Friday. Roy is Mamata Banerjee’s first aide in the chain of command, the one she trusts the most. During the elections, Roy dealt with much of the CPI(M) criticism of the black money use in the TMC campaign. He could well be the Union minister for railways, once Banerjee resigns and takes over as chief minister of West Bengal.
SHUVAPRASANNA
The painter, known for his depiction of crows, Shuvaprasanna was at the fulcrum of the paribartan chai campaign that hurtled Mamata Banerjee from being a street fighter to the CM-in-waiting. The loudest Banerjee supporter amongst the intellectuals, Shuva-da as he is often called, was also responsible for pushing the Nandigram campaign from the intellectual (and apolitical) to the TMC. Shuvaprasanna has since then managed the intellectual campaign for Banerjee, besides managing her art and its interpretations, which fetched more than Rs 4 crore at a city exhibit last month.
SOVAN CHATTERJEE
The 46-year-old has been an uninterrupted member of the Kolkata municipal council since 1985, becoming mayor less than a eyar before. He rose from being Banerjee’s do-it-all boy to being the city’s first citizen based on his complete loyalty to Banerjee, who does not take criticism well. He is now known now as Mamata Banerjee’s shadow, the one she trusts most after Mukul Roy.
SUBRATA MUKHERJEE
He has the rare achievement of being the Mayor of Kolkata as a Trinamool representative and Congress MLA at the same time. He has so often shifted his loyalty between these two political parties that the CPM had said during the election campaign that they came to know about his present affiliation only the day they found his name in the TMC candidates' list. Nevertheless, he has vast political experience, as the 65-year-old leader became an MLA for the first time in 1971. He is also hailed for his works as Mayor of Kolkata and is still an important member of Mamata’s team.
SHAONLI MITRA
Shaonli is part of the intellectual brigade that is, as it repeats often, the conscience and intelligence of West Bengal. A member of the ‘culture clan’, she is the daughter of theatre stalwarts Shombhu and Tripti Mitra, and a theatre artiste of some substance in her own right. Her role as a TMC propagandist is well known. A familiar face on TV, where she is openly critical of the Left, she recently took the attack to the CPI(M) on the ‘Animal Farm’ issue. She heads the Railways Committee on Heritage and Culture. She has claimed often that she is apolitical.
BRATYA BASU
Bratya Basu was catapulted into the public light during and in the aftermath of the Nandigram and Singur agitations. Basu has taken on the roles of professor at a city-based college, playwright and director, and apolitical intellectual campaigning for civil rights, before turning into a full-fledged politician. When in theatre, his plays like Ruddhasangeet were flamboyant in their openly anti-Left stance. He is now one of the pin-up boys of the Mamata Banerjee intellectual team and has defeated state housing minister and Left firebrand Gautam Deb from Dum Dum. Pre-poll calculations slot him as the favourite for information and culture minister in the TMC government.
MADAN MITRA
Secretary of the Progressive Taxi Association, he was with the TMC from the day the party's wheels started rolling. Mitra is a very known face in the transport unions and always seen with ‘Didi’, whether she is holding a press conference or on a 26-day hunger strike against farmland acquisition for the Tata Motors project at Singur. There may a be a lot of names doing the rounds for other portfolios, but when it comes to the transport ministry, even a cab driver in the city feels he is the only pick.
KALYAN BANERJEE
When the battle is a legal one, Trinamool MP Kalyan Banerjee is Mamata's key soldier. Lawyer by profession, he is always in charge of the party in legal battles, be it defending the party or taking out the fight against CPM in the court. However, the outspoken leader creates problems for his party at times, as he did with his derogatory remarks on Chief Minister Budhadeb Bhattacharjee before the Lok Sabha election. But nothing could stop him from winning the election from Sreerampore with a thumping margin.
PARTHA CHATTERJEE
He was associated with Andrew Yule till the late 1990s and left his lucrative corporate career to join the Trinamool in 2001. He is now a thoroughbred Trinamool man, in the standard green half-sleeve kurta and seems to have bid farewell to jacket and tie. As the leader of the opposition in the state assembly, he was seen in every part of the state on Didi's directives, taking the party movement to all corners. He is a hot pick as industry minister, but if Mamata is going to keep the ministry with her, as she told media earlier, no doubt some other key portfolio is waiting for him.
DEREK O’ BRIEN
The quizmaster has been with the TMC since 2004 and once even represented the party in the Rajya Sabha. It is O'Brien who brings his “workaholic didi” and her party to the world via social networking sites. Want to know what Mamata is upto? Look for O’ Brien’s tweets. Whether it is the mood of the party office on a poll day or the timing of Mamata’s press conference, he tweets on everything. Close aide of Banerjee, he takes care of the Trinamool Congress in the world of web.
