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<\/picture><\/div>\nCongress MP Rahul Gandhi criticised the Election Commission’s order barring the use of the Trinamool Congress (TMC) party’s election symbol and name. He said this fight is not Mamata Banerjee’s alone, adding that after “vote chori” (vote theft) and “sarkar chori” (government theft), the country is now witnessing “party chori” (party theft).<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n Rahul Gandhi wrote on X on Friday, “First Shiv Sena, then NCP, and now Trinamool Congress. The same pattern every time \u2014 the BJP and the Election Commission together break up a party, and then snatch its election symbol away.”<\/p>\n He added, “If an entire party can be stolen, it’s no surprise that the votes of crores of Indians can be stolen too. Vote chori. Sarkar chori. Now party chori \u2014 these have become symbols of our democratic decline.”<\/p>\n The Shiv Sena had split into the Uddhav Thackeray and Eknath Shinde factions on 21 June 2022. Similarly, the NCP split into the Sharad Pawar and Ajit Pawar factions on 2 July 2023.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Opposition backs TMC, says Election Commission a “puppet”<\/strong><\/span> Congress leader K.C. Venugopal:<\/strong> “The BJP has unconstitutionally seized the AITC’s name and election symbol. This is Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar’s late-night birthday gift to Modi ji. The Election Commission has once again proved that it is nothing but a puppet in the hands of the BJP.”<\/p>\n Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut:<\/strong> “This party was built by Mamata Banerjee through her hard work and struggle. Trinamool Congress has made an important contribution to state and national politics. Just as Shiv Sena has been Bal Saheb Thackeray’s party, Trinamool Congress is Mamata Banerjee’s party.”<\/p>\n SP leader Akhilesh Yadav:<\/strong> “If the Election Commission takes decisions that strengthen democratic values, its standing and respect will grow. I have nothing more to say \u2014 I only wish to ask whether the affidavit we submitted to the Election Commission has been received.”<\/p>\n Both factions submit their preferred names and symbols to the Election Commission<\/strong><\/span> The Commission had called representatives of both factions to a meeting in Delhi on Thursday. The party has two factions \u2014 one led by Mamata Banerjee, the other by Arup Roy.<\/p>\n The Commission said that since both factions are claiming to be the “real” party, the dispute will be decided under the rules of the Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) Order, 1968.<\/p>\n For now, an order has been issued barring the use of the existing symbol and name, and both TMC factions have submitted their preferred new names and symbols.<\/p>\n By-elections on 6 October, candidates to contest under new symbols<\/strong><\/span> By-elections for West Bengal’s Nandigram and Rezinagar assembly seats are due on 6 October. Both factions had fielded candidates under the same symbol. From the rebel TMC faction led by Ritabrata Banerjee, Mohammad Eteshamul Haque will contest Nandigram and Safiuddin Sheikh will contest Rezinagar.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, former CM Mamata Banerjee’s TMC had announced Sanchita Pradhan (Dey) for Nandigram and Rabiul Alam Chowdhury for Rezinagar as its candidates on Sunday.<\/p>\n <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Congress MP Rahul Gandhi criticised the Election Commission’s order barring the use of the Trinamool Congress (TMC) party’s election symbol and name. He said this fight is not Mamata Banerjee’s alone, adding that after “vote chori” (vote theft) and “sarkar chori” (government theft), the country is now witnessing “party chori” (party theft). Rahul Gandhi wrote…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":39737,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[94,44405,22906,22208,22550,44406,22107,22548],"class_list":["post-39736","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nation","tag-bjp","tag-democratic-decline","tag-election-commission","tag-indian-politics","tag-mamata-banerjee","tag-party-symbol","tag-rahul-gandhi","tag-tmc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/petrolnews.in\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39736","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/petrolnews.in\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/petrolnews.in\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/petrolnews.in\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/petrolnews.in\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39736"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/petrolnews.in\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39736\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/petrolnews.in\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39737"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/petrolnews.in\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39736"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/petrolnews.in\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39736"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/petrolnews.in\/live\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39736"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/images.bhaskarassets.com\/web2images\/1884\/2026\/09\/18\/image_1789710663.png\")
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