Kolkata, Jul 30 (PTI) The West Bengal unit of the BJP, in the run-up to the assembly elections due next year, will hold a four-day organisational meeting in Kolkata from Friday to reconstitute committees, bridge factional divides, and strengthen its booth-level network, party leaders said.
Central observers will join the state leadership in the exercise from August 1, which will seek to strike a balance between “veterans and new faces” while reconstituting the units, functionaries said.
Popularity in respective areas, a clean public image and commitment to the party’s ideology will be key factors in the selection process, they added.
While the BJP had announced 39 district presidents in March, four organisational districts — Darjeeling, Ghatal, Bongaon and Barrackpore — are yet to get chiefs. Elections to these posts will be held during the Kolkata session, party insiders said.
Newly appointed state president Samik Bhattacharya, who took over earlier this month, is leading the revamp in consultation with the central leadership and the RSS, the sources added.
Bhattacharya recently met Union Home Minister Amit Shah and the party’s top leadership in New Delhi and received a go-ahead for the overhaul.
“The effort is to bring several senior leaders to the frontline while inducting promising young faces so that both experience and new energy can be channelled effectively,” a senior functionary said.
The reorganisation comes at a critical time for the BJP, which has struggled to regain momentum in West Bengal since its bruising defeat in the 2021 assembly polls.
Despite a high-voltage campaign led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah, the BJP could win only 77 of 294 assembly seats, falling well short of its much-publicised ‘Mission 200’ target.
The slide continued in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, when the party’s tally in West Bengal dropped to 12 seats from the 18 it had won in 2019, raising alarm bells in the state unit. Party insiders admitted that persistent factionalism and organisational gaps had eroded its grassroots presence in several districts.
“There is no denying that Mamata Banerjee’s TMC remains a formidable force. We cannot afford to go to the polls divided,” a senior state leader said.
Another leader added, “The upcoming assembly elections will be a make-or-break contest for us in West Bengal. We need a stronger booth-level structure and better coordination to counter the TMC’s welfare-driven campaign machinery.” With the organisational reorganisation being his first major test, Bhattacharya’s leadership is under pressure to deliver results and reinvigorate the rank and file.
“This exercise will define how he is perceived within the state unit and by the central leadership,” another party functionary noted.
The four-day session is being seen as a crucial brainstorming session for the BJP as it attempts to plug organisational gaps, reduce infighting, and build a robust booth-level structure to challenge Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s TMC in the assembly polls next year. PTI PNT ACD
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