The Election Commission of India has formally split the Trinamool Congress into two camps. On September 18, 2026, the poll body allotted new names and symbols to the party’s two warring factions.

Mamata Banerjee’s group will now be known as Mamata All India Trinamool Congress. It will contest under a football player symbol. The rival camp, led by Ritabrata Banerjee, becomes Democratic Trinamool Congress. It gets an envelope symbol. Both remain recognised parties in West Bengal, Meghalaya and Tripura.

It follows the September 17 freeze order. The Commission barred both camps from using the original All India Trinamool Congress name and its flower-and-grass symbol until the leadership dispute is settled through a full hearing.

The interim arrangement covers the West Bengal bye-elections in Nandigram and Rejinagar on October 6. Mamata Banerjee called it a black day for democracy. She said her faction would challenge it politically, democratically and legally.

The Supreme Court has asked the ECI to decide the symbol dispute within four months. A bench led by CJI Surya Kant noted that delay had damaged the Shiv Sena case earlier.

The split began after the party’s May 2026 assembly defeat, its first since its founding on January 1, 1998.