NEW DELHI: The BJP’s instinct for staying several steps ahead of the electoral calendar was unmistakable last week, with the party shifting its organisational focus to West Bengal even before the Bihar Assembly results were declared. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah had already signalled to the party cadre that Bengal is the next major battleground, reinforcing the message that the BJP’s campaign machinery never really stops. One election winds down only for another to gather speed.
A day before the Bihar verdict came out, the party quietly finalised a list of leaders from Chhattisgarh ministers, general secretaries and secretaries who would now be deployed in West Bengal to take charge of preparations for the May 2026 Assembly elections. The quick redeployment reflected the BJP’s corporate-style efficiency, an approach that has become its hallmark in recent years. A senior Chhattisgarh-based party functionary told this reporter that he had barely returned from Bihar where he had been overseeing campaign strategy, advising BJP candidates and handling booth-level management when he was informed that he would now need to take charge of responsibilities in Bengal. He said he could not even spend adequate time with his family in Chhattisgarh due to the Bihar polls, and now he has already been assigned to the next task. According to him, this level of pressure and urgency shows the seriousness with which the BJP approaches elections.
Another party MP said that while the opposition often attributes the BJP’s election results to “money” or “management tricks”, such explanations overlook the far more demanding and continuous organisational work that takes place behind the scenes pointing to his own scheduled programmes in West Bengal as an example.
For the BJP, Bengal remains a long-term project. The party’s momentum grew dramatically in 2019 when it won 18 of West Bengal’s 42 Lok Sabha seats, signalling a major shift in the state’s political landscape. In the 2021 Assembly elections, the BJP secured 77 of 294 seats even as Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress returned with a commanding victory, winning 213 seats. Thereafter, the BJP’s Lok Sabha performance in 2024 saw a sharp decline, with the party winning only 12 seats compared to its 2019 tally, while the TMC bounced back with 29 seats. Since then, the BJP has treated the state as unfinished political ground, with a clear intention to challenge and potentially unseat the TMC government in 2026.
With the election still more than seven months away, the decision to begin groundwork now reinforces the belief that the BJP sees campaigns not as seasonal exercises but as full-time operations. The rapid redeployment of senior leaders from Bihar to Bengal, the early activation of organisational structures and the clarity of direction from the top leadership all signal a party preparing long before the battle formally begins.
