Banners with BJP symbol and message requesting Sovan Chatterjee to take up reins of Kolkata put up

Banners, with the BJP's lotus symbol, image of former Kolkata mayor and disgruntled party leader Sovan Chatterjee and a message requesting him to return and take up the reins of the city, have been put up in many areas, fuelling speculations that he might be the saffron party's face in the upcoming civic polls.

Chatterjee, along with his family friend Baishakhi Bandopadhyay, had joined the BJP in August last year, months after he had resigned as a minister in the Trinamool Congress government and Kolkata mayor.

However, he has not been seen in any public programme of the BJP since then.

Bandopadhyay earlier claimed that Chatterjee had expressed his desire to quit the saffron fold for being "regularly humiliated", but he has not made any public announcement yet.

Asked about the development, West Bengal BJP president Dilip Ghosh said there are people who want Sovan Chatterjee in Kolkata Municipal Corporation polls, slated for April.

"We are in touch with him. There are people who are his followers. They want him to be there during the KMC polls," Ghosh said.

State BJP vice president Jaiprakash Majumdar said no one can deny the fact that "Sovan Chatterjee is more known and has greater experience as mayor than the present mayor Firhad Hakim. Our party respects that experience".

Hakim, however, declined to attach much importance to the development and said "it is an internal matter of BJP".

Chatterjee was Mayor of Kolkata from 2010 to 2018. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had asked him to resign from his post as both minister and mayor in November 2018 following problems in his personal life.