Trinamul Congress leader Abhishek Banerjee on Tuesday warned party functionaries that they would lose their posts if its candidate didn’t win the Cooch Behar Lok Sabha seat, said sources.

The Diamond Harbour MP issued the warning at a meeting he held with representatives of the party’s Cooch Behar district election committee and other units here. The meeting was held in the district Trinamul office in New Town.

Around 60 Trinamul leaders attended the two-hour-long meeting, where Abhishek made his intention clear to the gathering.

“We have to win the Cooch Behar seat. If we fail to do that, many of us, including ministers and other district leaders, might lose their posts,” a district Trinamul leader, who attended the meeting, quoted Abhishek to have said.

BJP’s Nisith Pramanik had won the Cooch Behar Lok Sabha seat in the 2019 general election. He defeated Trinamul’s Paresh Chandra Adhikari by a margin of 54,231 votes.

“The sitting BJP MP is an arch-rival of Trinamul’s Udayan Guha, who is also the north Bengal development minister. On March 19, both of them were involved in a confrontation and there has been a similar incident at Ghughumari in Cooch Behar recently. At today’s meeting, Abhishek asked the minister to restrain himself and maintain calm,” a source in Trinamul said.

The national general secretary of Trinamul landed on the Rasmela Ground in Cooch Behar by a helicopter around 1pm on Tuesday. He went straight to the Madan Mohan Temple and offered prayers and puja. Abhishek also prayed and performed puja at Kali and Ma Bhawani temples, which are located on the campus of the Madan Mohan Temple.

Emerging from the temple campus, Abhishek interacted with the people gathered and left for New Town.

A source in Trinamul said Abhishek had given additional responsibility to three veteran leaders in the district —Rabindranath Ghosh, Binoy Krishna Barman of Mathabhanga and Hiten Barman of Shitalkuthi.

“Mir Humayun Kabir, another veteran district Trinamul leader, also attended the meeting. He was the former president of Trinamul’s Dinhata 2 block committee and also a member of the Cooch Behar zilla parishad. Kabir was also included in the Trinamul’s election committee in the district,” a source said.

“We have to stay united and we will win the Cooch Behar Lok Sabha seat this time,” Ghosh, a veteran Trinamul leader and the chairman of the Cooch Behar municipality, said after the meeting.