KOLKATA: The Bharatiya Janata Party’s emphatic triumph in Bihar has sparked a wave of jubilation and renewed ambition among the saffron party’s Bengal ranks, with leaders and workers openly declaring that the results next door have laid the path to power in West Bengal. Party offices across Kolkata witnessed scenes of celebration as sweets were distributed and slogans of “Next is Bengal!” echoed through corridors where strategy for the high-stakes 2026 Assembly elections is already being shaped. As the NDA swept to a decisive victory in Bihar, the BJP drew fresh energy from the win calling it “oxygen” for its mammoth battle to dislodge the fifteen-year-old Trinamool Congress regime in Bengal.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s address at the BJP headquarters set the tone for what party strategists called a “Bengal encore”. With unmistakable symbolism, Modi evoked the flow of the Ganga from Bihar to Bengal, claiming that the river itself had shown the way for a political resurgence eastward. “Jungle raaj ko ukchar phekegi” he thundered, forecasting that Bengal, much like Bihar, would reject what the BJP casts as prolonged lawlessness under Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s leadership.
Leaders in the West Bengal BJP echo Modi’s sentiment, viewing the Bihar landslide as both a vindication of the NDA’s governance agenda and proof that a vigilant Election Commission can reshape political destinies. Suvendu Adhikari, Leader of the Opposition, maintained that the end of Trinamool’s reign was inevitable if Bengal’s Assembly polls are conducted with the same transparency as Bihar. “People will vote against misrule, corruption, and the collapse of law and order. Free and fair polls can ensure change,” Adhikari insisted as he distributed sweets to celebrate the Bihar win.
Central to the BJP’s confidence is the controversial Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls—a process which preceded the Bihar elections and is now underway in Bengal. The BJP claims that the SIR will excise nearly one crore so-called “illegal or bogus” names, especially those of alleged Bangladeshi and Rohingya infiltrators. Bengal BJP leader and former MP Locket Chatterjee argued that these voters have propped up narrow Trinamool victories in prior polls, and that a “clean voters list” could decisively tilt the scales in BJP’s favour in seats where margins have been wafer-thin. “The Bihar result will definitely resonate in Bengal because the SIR was one of the major electoral issues there, just as it will be here. This is a victory for a clean electoral roll,” asserted BJP worker Narayan Chattopadhyay. Union Minister Giriraj Singh went further, branding the exercise a necessary purge and asserting that only removal of illegal migrants could unseat the TMC.
The BJP’s Bengal office has become ground zero for celebrations and organisational meetings in recent days. Jubilant workers gathered at Muralidhar Sen Lane and Salt Lake, singing and distributing sweets, convinced that Bihar’s outcome signals their coming triumph. State general secretary Jagannath Chattopadhyay described it as an unstoppable march: “After Odisha and Bihar, now Bengal. There is no looking back now,” he declared. Senior leaders such as Samik Bhattacharya and Sukanta Majumdar declared a shift to “attack mode,” with the leadership bringing its full organisational machinery to bear on voter outreach and booth-level mobilisation, especially around the SIR process. BJP leader Agnimitra Paul typified prevailing sentiment, drawing sharp parallels between the “dark age of jungle raj under Lalu Prasad in Bihar and present-day Bengal: “People will eradicate jungle raj from Bengal,” she asserted.
Against this upsurge of optimism, Trinamool Congress leaders fiercely argued that the “soil” and “political equations” of Bengal are fundamentally different and that the BJP’s bravado would come to nought. TMC general secretary Kunal Ghosh and a gaggle of other spokespersons dismissed suggestions of a Bihar ripple effect, predicting instead an overwhelming fourth-term mandate for Mamata Banerjee with more than 250 seats. “”That is Bihar’s equation. It has no connection with Bengal. It will not affect Bengal. In Bengal, the factors are development, unity, harmony, rights, and self-respect,” Ghosh asserted in a series of posts.
