‘Constituencies with Hindi-speaking people would be impacted by Bihar results’.
New Delhi: The resounding victory of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) led by the BJP in the Bihar Assembly elections, which concluded earlier this week, has bolstered the BJP in the neighbouring state of Bengal, which is going to the polls in May next year. BJP workers in Bengal have already started celebrating the victory of the party in Bihar, hoping that the same would be reflected in their state.
Several BJP leaders and their party cadres have taken to social media to sound an alarm for the Mamata Banerjee government, reminding her that it is time for her to exit Bengal.
Some of the messages which are flying high among BJP cadres in Bengal since Tuesday night after it became clear that the BJP-led NDA was coming back to power in Bihar, include messages like “Modi hai to mumkin hain”, “Bihar er dekhano pothey Poschim Bongey sesh hobey Mamatar Jangal Raj” (through the path shown by Bihar, Bengal will end the Jungle raj of Mamata), “ebar Bangla, parle samla” (Now Bengal, if possible save it).
A senior BJP leader from Bengal told this correspondent, “It is of course very good news for the BJP in Bengal. This victory of the BJP in Bihar has definitely acted as a morale booster for the party cadres who were wary of the results post the exit polls. There are many constituencies in Bengal which have a sizable number of Hindi-speaking population which would directly be impacted by the outcome of the Bihar election results. Moreover, some of the constituencies bordering the Bihar and Jharkhand border would also now be stronger, given that the BJP has made it to power in Bihar. These constituencies in Asansol and Durgapur would have otherwise become difficult for the BJP had the party lost in Bihar.”
The BJP has won 74 out of the 110 Assembly seats it contested in Bihar, having a strike rate of 67%, the highest among all the contesting parties in the state. This, the BJP hopes to reflect in the upcoming West Bengal elections where the BJP would be taking on the Mamata Banerjee government in her own citadel.
Several BJP workers that this correspondent spoke to from different parts of the state have equivocally said that the Bihar election results have given them enough energy needed to take on the Trinamool Congress in Bengal.
Grassroots workers of the BJP, who were working amidst the internal feud within the BJP which had somewhat dented their morale over the last few months, have been energised and many district level leaders are also holding victory rallies in their districts to celebrate the win of the BJP.
This is being done to enthuse the cadres fighting a tough battle against the Mamata Banerjee-led TMC, in the coming months.
Dilip Ghosh, president of the Bengal unit of the BJP, told The Sunday Guardian that the victory of the BJP in Bihar is, of course, a morale booster for the party cadre in Bengal and more so because Bengal and Bihar are neighbours and share a common culture and a lot of Bihari population live in Bengal.
“Victory is always happy, and this victory will definitely increase our self- confidence since we are going to the polls just months later and Bihar being a neighbouring state, this is an added booster for us and our workers. But we will also have to remember that the politics of Bengal is quite different and we have been fighting a battle here against the autocratic Mamata Banerjee government and slowly winning. We have won several Panchayats and then 18 Lok Sabha seats in 2019. We will also be successful in the Vidhan Sabha elections in Bengal, but for that, the strategy for Bengal will be different. The workers are fighting here, they are shedding their blood and 120 of our workers had to martyr themselves. So, the people of Bengal have realised what Mamata Banerjee is and have started blessing us.”
However, the TMC has said that Bihar and Bengal cannot be equated and that the politics and political dynamics in the two states are very different and for the BJP in Bengal, the people of Bengal do not trust the BJP and that Bengal will once again bless Mamata Banerjee and her “Maa Mati Manush” government. They have also said that like the way the anti-incumbency factor did not play a role in Bihar, similarly, such factor would also not play out in Bengal.