West Bengal civic polls debacle triggers unease and blame game in BJP

Rather than introspection on the abysmal performance, mutual criticism took lead in the party meeting

The growing unease in the West Bengal Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) over party’s electoral debacle in the recently concluded civic polls has triggered a blame game and war of words among the senior leaders of the party.

On Saturday, the party organised “ Chintan Baithak” where calls for introspection of the party’s electoral debacle grew louder. In the elections to 108 civic bodies the BJP could not even win a single municipality while the Trinamool Congress swept 102 municipalities. In terms of vote percentage, the Left parties marginally scored better votes than the BJP and even won a civic body.

BJP State general secretary and Hooghly Lok Sabha MP Locket Chatterjee was among those who was most vocal at the “ Chintan Baithak”. Ms. Chatterjee also questioned the appointment of new office bearers of the party and said that these appointments were not “merit” but on a “quota system” where preferences of individual leaders got precedence. “We have to introspect on what led to such a massive drop in our vote share. What went wrong? We need to fill those gaps and prepare ourselves for the next Lok Sabha polls,” Ms. Chatterjee had said after the party’s civic poll debacle.

 On Sunday former State BJP president and national vice president Dilip Ghosh said that Ms. Chatterjee remarks did not amount to “introspection” but “criticism”. Ms. Chatterjee retorted by saying that Mr. Ghosh should have reacted to her remarks when the meeting was going on. The State BJP dismal performance is reflected in the voting percentage of saffron party dropped from 38% in the 2021 Assembly polls to 13% in the civic polls. Leader of Opposition and BJP MLA from Nandigram Suvendu Adhikari who has been silent on the differences in the party gave the “ Chintan Baithak” a miss.

Amidst the demands for introspection, State President Sukanta Majumdar has come with an interesting explanation for the party’s loss. “ Today we are witnessing a new slogan Trinamoole notun daak, Kaste haturi beche thak [Trinamool’s new slogan, Let Left remain relevant],” Mr. Majumdar said. According to the Balurghat MP, while indulging in electoral malpractices, while the Trinamool cadres were polling eight votes for Trinamool, they were polling two in favour of the Left parties. Leaders in the State BJP are not fully convinced with Mr. Majumdar explanation and are of the opinion that blaming Trinamool for party’s disastrous performance is not going to solve issues for the BJP in West Bengal.