Central leadership must take note of defections in Bengal BJP

Another day, another defection. Since May 2021 till date… seven MLAs and two MPs from BJP have defected to TMC bringing the total number of defections to a whopping 9 in less than 12 months!

The recent case in hand is that of heavyweight neta Arjun Singh who was denied a TMC ticket in 2019 and had switched over to BJP in the same year and in a close contest, defeated the TMC candidate from Barrackpore.

But ever since his victory, there were a number of clashes in the region and Arjun Singh, of late, had been expressing his unhappiness over not being allowed to work freely in the BJP and was not quite unhappy with the response of Union minister Piyush Goyal when he met him over the imbroglio in the jute industry

Singh had even expressed his willingness to join an agitation to save the jute industry even if a movement was spearheaded and supported by the TMC! Singh had given several hints of his unhappiness during his stint in the BJP.

Addressing a press conference, Singh also alleged that the saffron party’s graph was on the decline as it was trying to ‘control Bengal’ through Facebook, instead of getting on the ground. Hours after Singh returned to TMC, the BJP, on Sunday, said that “such people keep coming and going”.

Dilip Ghosh said resignation is a “personal choice” and a single candidate leaving “does not have any effect on the party.” What surprised many was when he went on to say, “It is normal in Bengal politics to make bombs.” Lashing out at Singh, Ghosh said, “those who don’t practise politics based on principles” will find it difficult to stay in the BJP.

Reporters were quick to remind him of his allegation in the past that Arjun Singh makes bombs and questioned why he had taken him into the BJP in the first place, if that was true.

“We have inducted a lot of people. In politics, making bombs is a normal thing in Bengal,” Ghosh said.

Trinamool will be like this only. The law is there to deal with it. The place where he is from, either he creates trouble or others create trouble to target him. When he came to the BJP, the torture against him increased. This we have seen. I have taken up his complaints in Parliament as well. He could not adjust, that is his problem,” the BJP leader added.

The BJP’s fortunes witnessed a massive slide in a few months. After Sukanta Majumdar took over as president of the West Bengal BJP unit from Dilip Ghosh, he wanted a massive overhaul of the party’s organizational structure. However, this move reportedly ended up angering many MPs and party leaders, who quit the party’s WhatsApp groups and expressed their unhappiness after they were left out of the state committee. Majumdar took a stern step and dissolved all departments and cells of the state unit and also expelled some dissenters. But the rebels grew stronger and the voice of protest grew shriller by the day.

Bongaon’s MP Shantanu Thakur, who belongs to the influential Matua community was among the unhappy lot. It is riding on his political clout that the BJP had gained a foothold in South Bengal. Meanwhile, the Matuas were also upset with the Saffron party for the delay in CAA implementation.

Soon after the TMC’s victory in the assembly elections last year, when there were reports of massive postpoll violence, grassroots cadres felt that the state top brass needed to do more.

Kailash Vijayvargiya, incharge of the BJP in Bengal, hasn’t returned to the state since May 2021’s disastrous poll outcome which may have obviously irked grassroots workers.

It is high time for the central leadership… Union Home Minister Amit Shah and the party’s national president JP Nadda should be doing the needful to boost the morale of the workers who are watching the continuous defections.

The Saffron party at the Centre should realise that with the current state leadership not much can be expected. BJP in Bengal is badly in need of an unanimously acceptable face who can stall tall amid the ruins and pick up the party from the ruins like a phoenix.

The party’s occasional dependence on central leaders sends out a message to the voters that the party is in dearth of local leaders who would stand by the workers in the hour of crisis.

The central leadership ASAP needs to take a more aggressive step in instilling people’s faith… especially keeping in mind that the Lok Sabha is in 2024 and West Bengal has 42 seats.

In a high during the 2019 Lok Sabha, the BJP managed to bag 18. However, going by the current scenario, the BJP must go back to the drawing board considering the fact that in the entire east and northeast, West Bengal has the highest number of LS seats and the party can’t take it lightly.

THE VIEWS EXPRESSED BY THE AUTHOR ARE PERSONAL

ROBIN ROY The writer is Senior Associate Editor, Free Press Journal, Mumbai and former Managing Editor, First India