Bengal BJP MPs, MLAs waiting to jump ship, abort plan for now

New Delhi: Several BJP MPs and MLAs from Bengal who were waiting for the UP Assembly election results to take a decision to quit the BJP, have, for now, aborted their plan after the massive win for the BJP in Uttar Pradesh and three other states in the recently concluded Assembly elections.
According to party sources, at least four of the 17 BJP MPs from Bengal were in advanced stages of quitting the BJP and either join the Trinamool Congress (TMC) or think of other alternatives. All these MPs who were deliberating to quit the party belonged from the South Bengal region of West Bengal. Party sources also hinted that at least half a dozen MLAs were also in the “wait and watch mode” for the election results, post which they would have also made their decision on whether to quit the party or not.
However, their plans have for now been aborted since the BJP came back to power in UP with a massive mandate and won three other states, including Goa, Manipur and Uttarakhand. These leaders believe that by winning these four states, the party’s position has been solidified in the country for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections and, therefore, they would like to wait and see what the party from here on does in West Bengal.
According to sources close to some of these fence-sitting BJP leaders from Bengal, the party would struggle to win even 10 Lok Sabha seats from the state if the party does not change its style of functioning and becomes an “inclusive party”. The BJP had won 18 of the 42 Lok Sabha seats from Bengal in the 2019 parliamentary elections. Some of the MPs who were deliberating to quit the party also complained of the BJP “not being serious” about West Bengal since they faced a defeat in the Assembly elections held last year.
“Despite repeated electoral losses being faced by the BJP in Bengal, the party is in no mood to make course corrections. The party has lost its base on the ground, there are no grassroots workers left with the party. Most of them have either switched to the TMC or have gone underground. Despite this, the state leaders are taking no action and instead fighting with each other. Why would a leader continue with the party when they are seeing that the leaders are not showing any interest in reviving the party in the state?” a source close to one of the four fence-sitting BJP MPs told this correspondent.
The BJP recently lost the municipal elections in West Bengal and was pushed to the number three spot in terms of vote share, making the Left emerge as the second party in the state, at least according to the result of these 108 civic body elections held last month. The continuing infighting within the BJP has also irked many leaders of the party. The different lobbies created in the Bengal unit of the BJP are dampening the party’s prospect in the state, said one of the dissenting MPs that this correspondent spoke to. According to party sources from Bengal, one of the BJP Bengal lobbies is led by MP and former state president Dilip Ghosh, another is led by Leader of the Opposition in West Bengal assembly Suvendu Adhikari, while the current state president Sukanta Mazumdar is trying to build his own lobby in the state.
Some MPs also complain about how the Central leadership is not paying much attention to the issues of Bengal and that simple decisions over requests being made by the MPs to the state unit are taking months to materialise. A source close to one of the MPs also cited an example of how the central BJP leaders have not been able to change the state in-charge of Bengal for almost a year now, despite the current state in-charge Kailash Vijayvargiya not visiting the state even once since June last year.