The Trinamul Congress has set a goal of ensuring large participation of the rank and file in the age group of 25-30 in the Martyrs’ Day rally in Calcutta on July 21 in order to familiarise younger generations with the significance of the occasion.

Several senior Trinamul leaders said district units had been asked to make sure that 50 per cent of the people they sent to Calcutta for the Thursday event at Esplanade should represent the 20-35 age group.

“It is 29 years since the tragic, outrageous incident happened on July 21, 1993, in the heart of the city. Most of the youths who are flag-bearers of the party now were born between the late 1980s and the late 2000s, and have no real memory of the movement, the massacre, the protests, or why it is our Martyrs’ Day,” said a senior leader in Calcutta.

“That is why the party wants to bring more from the younger generations to Esplanade. We want them to experience the historic event firsthand and also learn more about the occasion’s significance,” he added. “Also, some people are beginning to forget that the youth wing of the party is the backbone of this event.”

On July 21 in 1993, 13 people had died in police firing when the Left Front was in power during a protest led by Mamata Banerjee, then a youth Congress leader. She had led a march to Writers’ Buildings demanding that voter cards be made mandatory to exercise franchise and accusing the CPM of rigging the 1991 Assembly elections.

Mamata formed Trinamul in 1998 and the party has been ruling Bengal since 2011. She has been observing July 21 with a mega event at Esplanade since, bringing in lakhs from across the state.

“The preparation to stimulate the younger minds, in our newer generation, began at least a month ago. The party took multiple initiatives like countless small rallies, release of videos and speeches of senior leaders, various forms of social media outreach… to pique their interest in the significance and the sentiment of July 21,” said Trinamul state general-secretary Kunal Ghosh.

Trinamul leaders organised rallies in every small pocket of rural Bengal, where senior (in terms of age) leaders or workers, who had witnessed July 21, 1993, were brought to speak. Trinamul’s official social media platforms shared experiences of around 100 leaders who were present at the Calcutta protest on the day, 29 years ago.

Soumen Bhakat, Trinamul’s Rampurhat town unit chief, said around 10,000 from the Birbhum urban centre would be in Calcutta on Thursday.

“We have ensured that at least 6,000 of the 10,000 are youths aged below 35,” said Bhakat, who is also the chairman of the Trinamul-run Rampurhat municipality.

Around 40,000 people from Purulia are expected to reach Calcutta by Wednesday evening, including more than 22,000 in the 20-35 age bracket.

“We made separate lists of the youths attending the rally from each of 20 blocks in our district. We tried to follow the direction of our senior leaders to take more youths to Esplanade,” said Trinamul’s Purulia unit chief Soumen Belthoria.

Trinamul’s national general-secretary Abhishek Banerjee, the party’s youth wing

chief till last summer, visited the Kshudiram Anushilan Kendra in central Calcutta on Tuesday to oversee accommodations for the party’s workers and supporters. He had paid similar visits to Salt Lake’s Central Park and Kasba’s Geetanjali Stadium on Saturday.

Tens of thousands of workers and supporters, especially from some remote parts in the west and the north, have already arrived. Many more are on the way.