Mamata Roy is an Indian

anganwadi worker Anganwadi () is a type of rural child care centre in India. It was started by the Indian government in 1975 as part of the Integrated Child Development Services program to combat child hunger and malnutrition. ''Anganwadi'' in Hindi means ...

and former member of the

West Bengal Legislative Assembly The West Bengal Legislative Assembly (ISO 15919, ISO: ''Paścimabaṅga Vidhānasabhā'') is the unicameral legislature of the Indian state of West Bengal, located in eastern India. It consists of 294 members directly elected from single-seat ...

. Between 2011 and 2016, she served as the representative of the Dhupguri constituency and as a member of the

Communist Party of India (Marxist) The Communist Party of India (Marxist) (abbreviated as CPI(M)) is a Communism in India, communist List of political parties in India, political party in India. It is the largest communist party in India in terms of membership and electora ...

Personal life

Mamata Roy is a resident of

Dhupguri Dhupguri is a town and a municipality of Jalpaiguri district near Jaldhaka River in the state of West Bengal, India. It is the headquarters of the Dhupguri subdivision. Geography General Dhupguri has an average elevation of 80 metres (2 ...

town in the

Jalpaiguri district Jalpaiguri district () is a district of the Indian state of West Bengal. The district was established in 1869 during British Raj. The headquarters of the district are in the city of Jalpaiguri, which is also the divisional headquarters of Ja ...

West Bengal West Bengal (; Bengali language, Bengali: , , abbr. WB) is a States and union territories of India, state in the East India, eastern portion of India. It is situated along the Bay of Bengal, along with a population of over 91 million inhabi ...

. She received her education from the Bairatiguri High School from where she passed out in 1992 and became an

Integrated Child Development Services Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) is a government program in India which provides nutritional meals, preschool education, primary healthcare, immunization, health check-up and referral services to children under 6 years of age and thei ...

worker. Roy identifies herself as a

communist Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, di ...

Political career

In the 2007 elections for the municipality of Dhupguri, Roy contested as a candidate of the

and was elected from ward number 7, polling at 58.92% of the votes cast in her favor. Before the

2011 West Bengal Legislative Assembly election Assembly election was held in Indian state of West Bengal in 2011 to elect the members of West Bengal Legislative Assembly as the term of the incumbent government was about to expire naturally. The election was held in six phases between 18 Ap ...

, the communist party denied re-nomination for the legislator Laxmi Kanta Roy, two term incumbent from the Dhupguri constituency and instead nominated Roy to contest as the party candidate. Subsequently, she emerged as the winning candidate against her primary opponent, Mina Barman who was the wife of the

Trinamool Congress The All India Trinamool Congress (; AITC), simply known as Trinamool Congress, is an Indian political party that is mainly influential in the Federated state, state of West Bengal. It was founded by Mamata Banerjee on 1 January 1998 as a Lis ...

's district head and was therefore nominated as their candidate. Roy won the election polling at 42.25% of the votes cast in her favor against 39.82% of the votes cast in favor of Barman. During her tenure as the representative of the constituency, she was involved in organising a protest movement launched by the communist party in the Dhupguri area after a teenage girl was raped and murdered. The girl herself had earlier protested against a

kangaroo court Kangaroo court is an informal pejorative term for a court that ignores recognized standards of law or justice, carries little or no official standing in the territory within which it resides, and is typically convened ad hoc. A kangaroo court ma ...

who had assaulted her farmer father over an equipment renting dispute; the kangaroo court was notably held in the presence of local leaders of the Trinamool Congress. Roy was also involved in raising concerns and agitating against instances of starvation deaths in the tea gardens, and the lack of communication with local bodies and non-appointment of teachers by the state government in local educational institutions. In the

2016 West Bengal Legislative Assembly election Legislative Assembly elections were held in 2016 for 294 seats of the ''Vidhan Sabha'' in the Indian state of West Bengal. The All India Trinamool Congress under Mamata Banerjee won 211 seats, and thus was re-elected with an enhanced majority. ...

, she lost her seat in the legislature to the new Trinamool Congress candidate Mitali Roy, who had contested as an independent candidate in the previous election. In August 2020, Roy testified that she was contacted by the Trinamool Congress and presented with an offer to her supply her with funds to contest the

2021 West Bengal Legislative Assembly election The 2021 West Bengal Legislative Assembly election was the 17th quinquennial List of Indian state legislative assembly elections, legislative election held in Elections in West Bengal, West Bengal, to elect List of constituencies of the West ...

as their candidate from the constituency, which she refused. The incident was corroborated by Laxmi Kanta Roy who testified that a similar offer was rejected by him a few days earlier.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Roy, Mamata Living people Women members of the West Bengal Legislative Assembly Communist Party of India (Marxist) politicians from West Bengal Year of birth missing (living people) West Bengal MLAs 2011–2016 21st-century Indian women politicians People from Jalpaiguri district West Bengal municipal councillors