Early years In 1973, Mitra entered politics and became the president of the students' union of
Ashutosh College. He later became the south Kolkata president of the
Indian Youth Congress. Initially, he belonged to the
Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi faction. However, in 1976 he first switched to the
Somen Mitra faction and then to the
Mamata Banerjee faction. In 1990, he was appointed general secretary of the West Bengal unit of the Indian Youth Congress. Mamata Banerjee founded the
Trinamool Congress in 1998. In 2000, he was appointed general secretary of the party. Four years later, he became the president of the Trinamool Youth Congress. He became the sports minister and transport minister in the
First Mamata Banerjee ministry. On 18 November 2015, he resigned from the cabinet after being named as an accused in the
Saradha Group financial scandal. Mitra lost the
2016 West Bengal Legislative Assembly election from his constituency. He was defeated by Manash Mukherjee of
Communist Party of India (Marxist) by a margin of 4,198 votes. Following the defeat, he was relegated to the fringes of the party. On 26 April 2019, Mamata Banerjee announced that Mitra would contest the upcoming by-election for
Bhatpara constituency which had become vacant due to the defection of
Arjun Singh to the
Bharatiya Janata Party, but he was defeated by Pawan Kumar Singh. ==Personal life==