Mamata Banerjee addressed a rally in Kolkata last week (file)
Mamata Banerjee, the West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress chairperson, will hold a press conference in Kolkata on Monday, which is her first press meet since election strategist Prashant Kishor came to the aid of her party.
Mr Kishor, sources say, is skipping the press meet as his presence may deflect media's attention from a high power campaign that Ms Banerjee is expected to launch today.
Ever since Mr Kishor was brought to Mamata Banerjee's office by her nephew and party lawmaker Abhishek Banerjee on June 6, there has been a lot of curiosity about the deal between Mr Kishor's company IPAQ and Trinamool.
Mr Kishor recently had resounding success in Andhra Pradesh with Jagan Mohan Reddy, who dethroned Telugu Desam Party's Chandra Babu Naidu from the chief minister's chair.
That the Trinamool roped him in to help after the loss of 12 seats in the Lok Sabha polls is not surprising. Except for two things-- the Trinamool has not officially spelt out what the deal is, and Mr Kishor is the vice president of the Janata Dal United, an ally of Trinamool's biggest political rival, the BJP.
The Trinamool chairperson is also scheduled to meet her party's legislators, parliamentarians and district chiefs next week to lay out the roadmap for the 2021 assembly polls.
Last year, Ms Banerjee had set an ambitious goal at the Martrys Day rally, promising a clean sweep of all 42 parliamentary seats in the state and setting her sight on Delhi. But her Trinamool Congress lost 12 seats to the BJP, which scooped up 18 seats from a meagre two in the 2014 Lok Sabha election.
Last week, Ms Banerjee addressed a mega rally in Kolkata in which she accused the BJP of making inroads in the state through "money, police and EVM (Electronic Voting Machines)" and said in the coming assembly elections, they will "lose everything".