Less than a year after the death of former President Pranab Mukherjee, his son Abhijeet quit the Congress and joined the ruling Trinamul.

Abhijeet, who visited Trinamul Bhawan on Monday afternoon, was inducted to the party in the presence of senior party leaders Partha Chatterjee and Sudip Bandopadhyay.

His departure is hardly a blow to the Congress which has been heavily bleeding in Bengal since Mamata Banerjee walked out to form her own party in 1998. Abhijeet’s exit will add to the number and be another step to Mamata’s achieving a Congress-mukt Bengal.

In the last few weeks, the 61-year-old former MP has been active in his former Lok Sabha constituency Jangipur, which was represented by his father too towards the end of his political career.

Two weeks ago, Abhijeet visited Jangipur following the deaths of some residents in a lightning strike. During the visit, he met some of his former colleagues in the Congress, like Mohammad Sohrab, Amirul Islam, the district Trinamul president and MP Abu Taher Khan, state ministers Akhruzzaman and Sabina Yasmin.

On June 29, Abhijeet met Diamond Harbour MP and Trinamul’s all-India general secretary Abhishek Banerjee at his Camac street office that had fuelled speculation of the former’s joining Trinamul.

Abhijeet has privately expressed the desire to contest for the Assembly by-polls from the Jangipur Assembly seat where elections could not be held following the death of the RSP nominee for the seat.

The visit to Camac street, Abhijeet had claimed, was to invite the Trinamul all-India general secretary to attend an event to commemorate the first death anniversary of Pranab Mukherjee.

The former President passed away last year in August.

A former employee of the Steel Authority of India, Abhijeet joined politics a decade ago, making his debut as a legislator. A year later Pranab Mukherjee moved to Rashtrapati Bhawan, leaving his electoral legacy of barely seven years at Jangipur to his son. Abhijeet won the seat twice. In 2019, he was a poor third.

Neither Pranab Mukherjee’s legacy nor the polling machinery of state Congress president Adhir Chowdhury could help Abhijeet score a hat-trick.

The 2021 Assembly elections have proved the Congress citadel in Murshidabad is crumbling. In Chowdhury’s home turf, the sitting Congress MLA, Manoj Chakraborty, finished a poor third this time.

“Pranab babu would not have won from Jangipur had it not been for Adhir Chowdhury the first time. Adhir da gave the support to Abhijeet as well. After all, he was Pranab babu’s son. Now things have changed. Pranab babu is not alive and Adhir da has to save his own seat in 2024,” said a Congress functionary.

For Congress leaders in Calcutta, Pranab Mukherjee was essentially a Delhi leader, with almost zero base in Bengal, unlike a Priya Ranjan Das Munshi who had to contest elections and nurse a constituency.

The senior Mukherjee too had quit Congress in 1985 when Rajiv Gandhi was Prime Minister and returned three years later. It took him enormous hard work to regain the confidence of the Gandhis. It was only after Sonia Gandhi took charge of the party that Pranab Mukherjee found gainful employment in the party. Abhijeet never enjoyed that level of proximity with the Gandhis.

“He was in the party because of his father. Being Pranab babu’s son opened some doors,” said a Congress source.

Apart from adding another Congressman to its fold, Trinamul has little to gain from Abhijeet’s induction. Also, he is eyeing a seat for which Trinamul already has a nominee, Jakir Hussain, who won the seat in 2016 and became a minister.

“Jakir became a minister because he won a key seat in Murshidabad, a district that Mamata di wants to bring under her control in any way she can,” said a Trinamul source.

Till his departure to the BJP, Suvendu Adhikary was Mamata’s go to man for Murshidabad, where he engineered sizeable defections at all levels and ensured prominent positions for most of the defectors.

The problem for Trinamul is the bitter infighting in the party in Jangipur. Jakir and his nephew sustained injuries after crude bombs were hurled at them allegedly by another faction of the party in February.

“Ultimately, Mamata di will decide who will be nominated from Jangipur. Probably the leadership feels Pranab babu’s son will be acceptable to all,” the Trinamul source said.