The Trinamool Congress (TMC) has announced its list of 291 candidates for the upcoming West Bengal assembly polls, setting the stage for a high-stakes showdown between Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari.
Banerjee, who is seeking re-election from her traditional seat of Bhawanipore in south Kolkata, will face off against Adhikari in Nandigram, a seat that Adhikari won by 1,956 votes in 2021.
The TMC has dropped 74 sitting lawmakers and shifted 15 others to new seats, in a bid to nix anti-incumbency and win a fourth consecutive term.
The party has also fielded a number of fresh faces, including Arjuna awardee athlete Swapna Barman, who will contest from the Rajganj (SC) seat in Jalpaiguri district.
Despite facing corruption cases against several Bengal ministers and MLAs, the TMC leadership has exercised caution while finalising the list, party leaders said.
Former education minister Partha Chatterjee, a prime suspect in the teacher recruitment case, was not fielded from his Behala West seat in Kolkata, while MLA Jiban Krishna Saha, who was arrested by CBI in 2023 and by ED in 2025, was replaced by a female candidate.
The TMC has also taken some calculated risks, fielding candidates from areas where the party trailed the BJP in the 2024 Lok Sabha poll results.
Banerjee has expressed confidence that the TMC will win more than 226 seats in 2026, and has called on voters to boycott the BJP and vote for the TMC.
