TMC forms 12-member committee for Bengal polls

The Trinamool Congress on Friday announced a 12-member election committee that will look into the selection of candidates and plan a campaign for the upcoming assembly polls.

The panel will be headed by West Bengal Chief Minister and TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee, party's secretary-general Partha Chatterjee said after its core committee meeting.

Senior party leaders, MPs and MLAs are other members of the committee, he said.

Subrata Bakshi, Abhishek Banerjee, Sudip Banerjee, Derek O Brien, Sougata Roy and C M Jatua are members of the election panel.

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Firhad Hakim, Subrata Mukherjee, Partha Chatterjee Chandrima Bhattacharya and Aroop Biswas are also part of the team.

According to party sources, the TMC leaders had extensively discussed the issues related to the selection of candidates and planned for the campaign.

"Selection of the candidates will be an important thing this time and inputs from election strategist Prashant Kishor and his team I-PAC will play an important role in it," a party leader said.

Elections for the West Bengal assembly will be held in eight phases, up from seven last time, beginning with polling for 30 seats on March 27, Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora said while announcing the poll schedule.