The differences between Trinamool Congress and political advocacy group I-PAC came out in the open on Friday, with the group stating that it does not handle any digital properties of the Trinamool or its leaders and urged the party to look into how their digital properties and/or that of their leaders are being “allegedly (mis)used”.
“I-PAC doesn’t handle any digital properties of @AITCofficial or any of its leaders. Anyone making such a claim is either uninformed or is blatantly lying,” the agency said from its official handle.
During the day, State Minister Chandrima Bhattacharya objected to the display picture of her verified Twitter handle being changed. The changed picture gave the message that she supported ‘one-party one-person post’ policy in the party. The Minister went on to say that her account was being managed by I-PAC and insisted that she did not support the idea. Later in the day the display picture was removed.
The remarks come at a time when speculations were rife in political circles of differences between I-PAC and Trinamool Congress. The speculations gained credence when lists of candidates for municipal candidates were uploaded from official handles of the party. A section of the party leaders had blamed I-PAC for the goof-up.
There have also been reports of association between I-PAC and Trinamool, which was able to stop the BJP march in the State in 2021, coming to the end. In fact, a number of leaders of Trinamool Congress considered close to party general secretary Abhishek Banerjee have changed the display pictures on their Twitter profiles with the slogan, “I support one person, one post in AITC [Trinamool].”
The ‘one person in one post’ suggestion was first made by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. But evidently not everyone in the party is in agreement. The Trinamool in the recently held Kolkata Municipal Corporation polls went on to give ticket to MLAs and Ministers. Firhad Hakim, a key Minister in the West Bengal government, was appointed Mayor of the city’s civic body. Mr. Hakim on Friday advised party leaders against airing their views on social media. “ The party does not endorse the campaign on social media on the issue of one person in one post,” he said.
