The violence of Bengal politics shaped her too.
In 1990, during a protest march, she was allegedly assaulted by Communist cadres and hospitalised with a fractured skull.
The episode helped forge the persona she would cultivate for decades: part street fighter, part martyr – a perpetual insurgent even in power.
Banerjee’s ascent accelerated dramatically after her opposition to the proposed Tata Motors car factory in Singur and land acquisition in Nandigram by the Communist government in 2007.
Casting herself as a defender of farmers against forced industrialisation, she won fierce loyalty among rural and poorer voters. But the protests also alienated much of the urban middle class and business elite, who accused her of driving investment out of West Bengal.
“Mamata, like [Prime Minister and BJP leader] Narendra Modi, has been a politician all her life,” says Mukulika Banerjee, an anthropologist at the London School of Economics.
“Her opponents were elite bhadralok Communist men – members of Bengal’s educated, upper-caste middle-class elite – who looked down on her dark skin and lack of ‘respectable’ norms.”
Her early success “only intensified her commitment to stand by the common man – squatting with vendors, arriving wherever there was trouble, dressing simply and making it her hallmark style”.
“Those early battles made her fearless, realising she could make others feel the same, if she stood by them,” says Mukulika Banerjee.
Everyone called her ‘Didi’ – elder sister – because that was the role she came to embody: “a fiercely protective figure who would lay down her life for you”, she adds.
Unlike most prominent women in Indian politics, Mamata emerged without dynastic backing or a powerful mentor.
“No-one set up their own party, took on an invincible force like the Communists, ousted them after 34 years and then held power for three terms,” Mukulika Banerjee says.
“And unlike other female politicians, she actively brought other women forward.” (Her party fielded 52 women candidates in this election.)
