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Bengal assembly polls: The Congress hopes to regain lost ground in 4 districts
Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury reflects on his 1996 campaign as a fugitive, as Congress aims for a comeback in the 2026 elections after significant vote share losses.
The last time Congress veteran and former leader of the party in the Lok Sabha, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, contested the assembly election, he was a fugitive and couldn’t campaign openly for himself. That was in 1996.
“I was a fugitive back then. I couldn’t even campaign for myself publicly as I was absconding to evade arrest. There was no social media at that time. I had to go to a studio in Kolkata and get my speech recorded on cassettes and distribute them in my constituency. They were played at various places in the constituency, sometimes at tea stalls and sometimes through loudspeakers tied to a tree or a lamppost,” Chowdhury told the media in a recent interview.
Chowdhury was a suspect in the murder of a CPIM leader’s relative, but defeated CPIM’s Muzaffar Hossain from Nabagram in 1996 by a margin of 20,329 votes. In that election, while the ruling Left Front had bagged 204 seats and 50% of the vote share, the Congress alliance had won 85 seats and 40% of the vote share.
Chowdhury later went on to win the Baharampur Lok Sabha seat in Murshidabad five times in a row, starting in 1999. He lost to TMC’s Yusuf Pathan, a cricketer-turned politician, in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls by a margin of over 85000 votes.
The drop in Congress’ vote share over the years
The Congress has decided to contest all the 294 seats alone this time. While in 2016, the Congress entered into a seat-sharing deal with the Left Front, led by the CPIM, in 2021, they formed an alliance with the Left and the Indian Secular Front.
Two decades after the 1996 state polls, in 2016, the Congress’ vote share had dropped to 12.4%, and its seat count had almost halved to 42.
Over the next five years, the Congress was all but decimated, with its vote share dropping to 1.6% in 2021. The party could bag only one seat, Sagardighi, in a bypoll in March 2023. Bayron Biswas, the lone Congress legislator, however, joined the TMC two months later.
Even though the TMC won the Baharampur Lok Sabha seat in 2024, Chowdhury had a lead of around 7000 votes over the nearest BJP candidate in the Baharampur assembly seat that year.
This time, the Congress again fielded Chowdhury from the Baharampur assembly seat after a three-decade gap.
“In March 2023, I had proved that despite the TMC in power, the ruling party could be defeated in a bypoll. Biswas had won the seat. We expect to win quite a few seats in the 2026 assembly election in at least four districts – Murshidabad, Malda, Uttar Dinajpur and Purulia. I am confident and optimistic,” Chowdhury said.
Malda, Murshidabad and Uttar Dinajpur are the three Muslim-majority districts in West Bengal that share an international border with Bangladesh.
The Congress party’s prospects
In the 2016 assembly elections, the Congress party bagged 14 seats in Murshidabad, 8 in Malda, 3 in Uttar Dinajpur, and 2 in Purulia.
In Malda, Congress workers and supporters believe that the party’s strength increased manifold after two-time former Congress MP Mausam Noor recently returned to the party following her seven-year stint with the TMC.
“The homecoming of Mausam Noor was a big relief and, at the same time, a huge force multiplier for the party. She is the niece of former Congress veteran ABA Ghani Khan Chowdhury in Malda. Popularly known as Barkat da, Chowdhury was a heavyweight Congress leader, an eight-time MP and a former Union minister. The Chowdhury family is still seen as a guardian of Malda. Noor’s exit had not just split the party in the district, but also created tension in the Chowdhury family,” said Md Shamsul Haque, a Congress worker from Sujapur.
Noor won the Malda North Lok Sabha seat for the Congress in 2009 and 2014. After joining the TMC in 2019, she lost the seat to the BJP’s Khagen Murmu. Noor, who was made a Rajya Sabha member by TMC, returned to the Congress in January 2026 and resigned from Parliament.
“In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, I contested against my cousin Isha Khan Chowdhury in the Malda Uttar constituency. While he was contesting on a Congress ticket, the TMC had fielded me. I was afraid that, because of this fight, the BJP might gain an advantage and grab the seat. That’s precisely what happened,” she said.
BJP’s Khagen Murmu won the Malda Uttar seat, which was traditionally a Congress citadel, garnering 37.6% of the votes polled. While Noor bagged 31.4% votes, Chowdhury received 22.5% votes. In 2024, while Murmu retained the Malda Uttar seat, Chowdhury bagged the Malda Dakshin seat, defeating the nearest BJP candidate Sreerupa Mita Chaudhury by a margin of 1,28,368 votes.
The Malda South and the Malda North Lok Sabha seats were formed during the 2009 delimitation by splitting the old Malda seat that Gani Khan Chowdhury won eight times between 1980 and 2004 before his death in 2006.
Noor will contest from the Malatipur assembly seat in Uttar Malda.
“Isha da (brother) and I are the legacy of Ghani Khan Chowdhury. If we work together, not just the family, the party would also get strengthened. The Congress party was strong even without me. I will give my 100% and try to further strengthen the party. There are 12 seats in the Malda district. We are targeting all 12 seats,” she said.
