On March 29, 2026, the Congress party announced candidates for 284 of the 294 seats in the West Bengal Assembly elections, featuring heavyweights like Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury and Mausam Benazir Noor. The decision to contest all seats ends a decade-long electoral understanding with the CPI(M)-led Left Front. Candidates for 10 seats remain pending.
The Congress party on Sunday released a list of 284 candidates for the 2026 West Bengal Assembly elections, deciding to contest all 294 seats independently. This move effectively ends its decade-long alliance with the CPI(M)-led Left Front, now allied with the Indian Secular Front. Among the heavyweights fielded are former Lok Sabha leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury from Behrampore in Murshidabad district and former Rajya Sabha MP Mausam Benazir Noor from Malatipur in Malda district.
Noor, who rejoined Congress in January 2026 after her time with Trinamool Congress, hails from the family of veteran leader A.B.A. Ghani Khan Chowdhury. The nominations have intensified contests in central West Bengal, particularly Malda and Murshidabad, where Trinamool faces pressure from parties like Humayun Kabir’s Aam Janata Unnayan Party. In the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, Trinamool's Yusuf Pathan defeated Chowdhury in Behrampore by 70,000 votes.
Other candidates include Rohan Mitra, son of late MP Somen Mitra, from Ballygunge; former MLA Ali Imran Ramz, known as Victor, from Chakulia in Uttar Dinajpur; youth leader Ashutosh Chatterjee from Rashbehari; South Kolkata president Pradeep Prasad from Bhabanipur, where Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and Suvendu Adhikari are contesting; Mohit Sengupta from Raiganj; Asif Mehboob from Chanchal; Mostaq Alam from Harishchandrapur; Amal Acharya, recently from Trinamool, from Itahar; and Sheikh Zariatul Hossain from Nandigram.
Party sources said applications from several Trinamool-denied MLAs are under scrutiny for the remaining 10 seats. Nominations begin Monday for the first phase polling on April 23 across 152 seats, with the second and final phase on April 29.
