TMC bets on youth with 75% of assembly poll candidates below 60

Mamata Banerjee

• Trinamool fields younger candidates, only 25% are senior citizens
• 74 sitting MLAs dropped, making room for fresh faces
• Party keeps senior leaders for stability and grassroots power

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Trinamool Congress has fielded its most youthful assembly poll candidate list in recent memory, with only 25 per cent of its nominees being senior citizens,  a striking departure from the 2021 elections when 42.4 per cent of its candidates were above 60, according to a TOI report.

Of the 291 candidates named in the list released on Tuesday, 219 are below the age of 60. Nearly 45 per cent of even this younger cohort are aged 50 or below. While 72 candidates are above 60, only 25 — roughly 9 per cent — are over 70. In 2021, by contrast, just 167 candidates, or 57.5 per cent, were in the 25–60 age bracket, with 90 or 31 per cent, falling in the 61–70 range, TOI reported.

The shift reflects a prolonged internal debate driven prominently by party national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee, who has long argued for an informal age ceiling in politics and has suggested that, barring exceptional figures, politicians should consider stepping back after 70.

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, however, has maintained that experience and youth must coexist — and, as the report quoted a party senior as saying, the list appears to have translated this dual approach into electoral strategy.

Among the youngest entrants, four candidates are below 30, while 38 fall in the 31–40 age group. The largest cohort — 89 candidates — is in the 51–60 bracket, followed closely by 88 in the 41–50 age group.

Despite dropping 74 sitting MLAs to make room for fresh faces, the party has retained a core of seasoned leaders. Among the oldest are Samar Mukherjee, 83, a four-time MLA from Malda and minister Sovandeb Chattopadhyay, 82, who will contest from Ballygunge. Mamata Banerjee herself, at 70, is seeking a fourth term from Bhowanipore and continues to anchor the party's poll campaign.

Other notable senior figures retained include Arup Roy and Udayan Guha, both 70 and Firhad Hakim and Jyotipriya Mallick, both in their early 60s. TOI cited party insiders as saying their retention is aimed at stabilising organisational depth and preserving grassroots networks in crucial strongholds.

Among Trinamool's youngest entrants are Madhuparna Thakur, 27, Rituparna Adhya, 28, and Debangshu Bhattacharya and Rajib Biswas, both 29. Biswas, a medical professional who has quit his job to enter electoral politics, exemplifies the party's outreach to professionals and first-time entrants, the report noted.

The dropping of veterans including Abdul Karim Chowdhury, 80, Sabitri Mitra, 65, Manoranjan Byapari, 63, Giasuddin Molla, 70, and Asit Majumdar, 68, signals a willingness within the party to sideline long-serving figures in favour of renewal.

At the same time, the party has made space for political legacy by fielding children of several senior leaders. Shrreya Pandey has been given the Maniktala seat, which her late father Sadhan Pane won a record eight times.

Other second-generation candidates include Sirsanya Bandyopadhyay, son of MP Kalyan Bandyopadhyay; Tirthankar Ghosh, son of Nirmal Ghosh; Vasundhara Goswami, daughter of Kshiti Goswami; Shubhankar Singh, son of Shankar Singh; and Sandipan Saha, son of Swarnakamal Saha. Notably, Subhrangshu Roy — son of the late Mukul Roy and himself a former MLA — has not been renominated, the report added.