In a highly anticipated move on Wednesday, 58 MLAs of the Trinamool Congress led the first-ever split in the 28-year-old party, which Mamata Banerjee had formed in 1998 after breaking away from the Congress.The split was ironically led by former CPM cadre Ritabrata Banerjee, who had joined the Trinamool as late as 2020.Ritabrata was elected the Leader of the Opposition in the West Bengal Assembly today, with 58 party lawmakers backing him over Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay, earlier picked for the post by Mamata’s nephew Abhishek Banerjee.Speaker Rathindra Bose accepted Ritabrata’s claim, formalising the maiden split in the TMC.“The TMC Legislature Party is a team of 58 MLAs who won on the party symbol. Two more MLAs are likely to join us. We are the real and principal opposition in the West Bengal Assembly, as per parliamentary norms,” Ritabrata said, referring to the anti-defection law which requires a two-thirds of the party to break away to claim an independent standing.The condition was fulfilled today as 58 of the TMC’s 80 MLAs broke away and backed Ritabrata.As the Speaker accepted Ritabrata’s claim to the LoP post, a massive crisis unfolded in the TMC, which responded by dissolving all party organisational units and asking Kolkata Mayor Firhad Hakim to step down.Ritabrata earlier today went to the Assembly with letters of support from 58 MLAs to back up his claim to the LoP post.The new TMC also unveiled a leadership line-up naming Akhruzzaman as the chief whip and senior MLAs Javed Ahmed Khan, Sandipan Saha, Sabina Yasmin and Shiuli Saha as deputy leaders of the TMC in the Assembly.Veteran party MLAs Samar Mukhopadhyay, Arup Roy, Rathin Ghosh, Javed Khan and Prasun Banerjee also joined the dissidents, signalling a deep chasm between the Mamata-led organisation and elected MLAs.Importantly, Ritabrata said the 58 MLAs had requested Mamata to be the chief adviser to the TMC Legislature Party.The rebels, while declaring independence from the parent unit, sought to take Mamata along while distancing from her nephew.The signal was clear — nepotism will no longer be condoned.Two days ago, Ritabrata was expelled from the TMC along with Sandipan Saha for alleged forgery of their signatures on a letter proposing Chattopadhyay as the LoP in the state.CM Suvendu Adhikari has ordered a CID probe into the allegations even as several TMC MLAs rebelled against Chattopadhyay, who was Abhishek Banerjee’s choice for the post.The developments in Bengal are a rerun of the split in the AAP Legislature Party in the Rajya Sabha recently and the earlier splits in the Shiv Sena led by Eknath Shinde and the NCP led by the late Ajit Pawar in Maharashtra.What’s ironic though is that the first fissure in the TMC — a party that came up to challenge the Left Front rule in the state — has been engineered by a former CPM leader, who jumped ship to the TMC after being expelled by the CPM earlier in 2017.It was to fight the Left that Mamata had broken away from the Congress 28 years ago.When the 1998 All India Congress Committee session — famous for Sonia Gandhi acquiring the primary membership of the party — was held in Kolkata, Mamata boycotted it.She instead addressed her own parallel gathering announcing the formation of the Trinamool Congress and declaring that the Congress had grown too cosy with the CPM to even challenge, let alone upstage it.