Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, a Trinamool Congress (TMC) Member of Parliament, has resigned as the Barasat district president following a poor election showing [1].

The resignation signals internal friction within the TMC as leadership grapples with a significant loss of seats in the 2026 West Bengal assembly elections. The move highlights a growing divide between elected representatives and the party's external strategic consultants.

Dastidar said she took moral responsibility for the party's failure in the polls [1]. In addition to the electoral outcome, she said the political consultancy firm I-PAC mistreated party workers and implemented a flawed election strategy [3].

The scale of the defeat in the Barasat region was substantial. The Barasat Lok Sabha constituency comprises seven Assembly seats; in the 2026 elections, the BJP won five of those seats while the TMC won only two [2].

This internal rift comes amid broader electoral challenges in the state. Separate reports indicate that 3.2 million voters across West Bengal were summoned for SIR hearings [4].

Dastidar's departure from the district in-charge role follows the party's struggle to maintain its stronghold in the region, a failure she attributes in part to the disconnect between the consultants and the grassroots workers [3].

“Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar resigned as Barasat district president citing moral responsibility for the party’s poll debacle.”

The resignation of a sitting MP from a district leadership role suggests a systemic failure in the TMC's 2026 campaign architecture. By specifically naming I-PAC, Dastidar is highlighting a tension common in modern Indian politics: the conflict between data-driven strategies managed by external consultants and the traditional relationship-based mobilization managed by local party workers.