Bengal BJP gears up for assembly polls 2021, begins brainstorming session

Don't want to miss the best from Business Standard?

The West Bengal unit of BJP on Saturday began its two-day brainstorming session in West Burdwan district's Durgapur to list the do's and don'ts for the party workers in the run up to the 2021 state Assembly elections, party sources said.

The 'Chintan Baithak' is the first major meeting of the party after the Lok Sabha election results.

Apart from discussing organisational aspects, the meeting will chart the party's course for the Assembly elections, they said.

"The central leadership has set the agenda of the meeting, in which the roadmap for the 2021 elections, organisational issues and the ongoing membership drive are likely to be discussed," state BJP general secretary Sayantan Basu said.

The meeting is being attended by senior central leaders and all the office bearers of the party's state unit.

BJP's Bengal minder and general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya, national secretary (organisation) Shiv Prakash, co-incharge of Bengal Arvind Menon and BJP state president Dilip Ghosh are attending the meeting.

The central BJP leadership had set a target of one crore membership from West Bengal and the state unit has claimed to have enrolled around 60 lakh so far.

The membership drive will continue for the next few days.

State BJP sources said although the central leadership is happy with the party's "magnificent performance" in the Lok Sabha elections in West Bengal, where it won 18 out of the 42 Lok Sabha seats, it is not happy with the induction of leaders from other parties without "proper background check".

Another senior state BJP leader said on condition of anonymity that the reverting of five of the six TMC-controlled municipal bodies, which had switched over to the BJP after the Lok Sabha elections, to the ruling party in West Bengal has embarrassed the central BJP leadership.

"This has sent a wrong message. So, the central leadership wants us to have checks and balances to avoid such embarrassing situation. It was decided to form a committee comprising state leaders such as Dilip Ghosh and Subrata Chatterjee to screen people from other parties aspiring to join the BJP," he said.

The saffron party won 18 of the 42 Lok Sabha seats in the state this election, just four less than the TMC, garnering 41 per cent of the vote share.