After its crushing defeat in the 2026 West Bengal Assembly elections at the hands of the BJP, the Trinamool Congress (TMC)’s influence appears to be on the decline. This was also reflected by the results in the Falta seat after a recent repolling, where the Mamata Banerjee-led party finished fourth behind the winner BJP and the runner-up CPI(M) with the Congress getting third position. The Falta outcome has raised a crucial question: Will the TMC be able to regain ground in Bengal’s political landscape, or whether that vacuum be filled up by the Left and Congress? It remains to be seen, however, if the CPI(M) and the Congress could again forge an alliance in a bid to fill the vacuum in state politics left by the TMC. In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the Left-Congress alliance managed to lead in just 12 of the state’s 294 Assembly segments.…