Kolkata: A month after it had lost power in West Bengal and barely days after 58 rebel MLAs seized control of its legislature party, the TMC finds itself confronting a question that would have sounded inconceivable just a month ago: can a party built around Mamata Banerjee survive when her authority over it is no longer absolute?
For nearly three decades, the TMC's internal order rested on one unquestioned truth: Mamata Banerjee was the party, and the party was Mamata Banerjee. For the first time in its history, that equation is being challenged.
