Concerned over his social gathering’s defeat within the April-May West Bengal meeting polls, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s state unit president Dilip Ghosh has began chalking out plans to tackle the ruling Trinamool Congress within the elections for greater than 100 civic our bodies to be held this 12 months.
Speaking to News18, Ghosh stated, “Yes, polls are scheduled to be held this year in more than 100 civic bodies and we are aiming for it. We still have a good number of supporters in Bengal. Our vote share increased from 4 per cent in the 2011 assembly polls to more than 40 per cent in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. It dipped a little bit this time (the assembly elections) but we are not losing hope as far as the civic polls are concerned.”
Polling in 107 municipalities throughout the state is due and, on a number of events earlier than the meeting elections, Ghosh had claimed that the TMC was frightened of holding the civic polls as a result of chief minister Mamata Banerjee knew her social gathering would face a humiliating defeat. In the state election outcomes introduced on May 2, nevertheless, the saffron social gathering remained restricted to only 77 seats in Bengal as a substitute of getting wherever near the 200-plus goal that was repeatedly and publicly projected by its high leaders throughout ballot campaigns. The TMC swept the fiercely fought polls, bagging 213 of the 292 seats obtainable. Now that the political scenario will not be beneficial for the BJP, Ghosh has requested social gathering employees to extend mass join with the individuals in all of the 107 municipalities throughout the state. The social gathering is especially centered on the 144 wards within the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) space.
When requested how tough it might be for him to retain his crew as there are reviews that numerous BJP leaders might swap to the TMC camp forward of the civic polls, Ghosh stated, “In Bengal, all elections are challenging and therefore we are not taking the municipal polls lightly. We have seen how despite winning several gram panchayat seats, the Trinamool Congress didn’t allow our leaders to run the panchayats. The winning candidates were attacked and murdered. They were forced to take shelter in other states. Not the least, TMC leaders didn’t allow us to file nominations during panchayat polls. These are the challenges we are expecting during the civic polls. As far as the possibilities of BJP leaders joining the TMC camp are concerned, I have nothing to say. In politics, such things happen and there is nothing unusual. People will come and they will quit. But I believe that my old BJP leaders will stick with us and they will work hard to steer the party forward.”
The BJP has additionally began making ready report playing cards of the TMC councillors to focus on failures. The social gathering will underscore the menace of dengue in Kolkata, poor infrastructure of municipality-run colleges and healthcare centres, in addition to insufficient sanitation work.
About the turncoats from the TMC who did not carry out for the BJP within the meeting polls, Ghosh stated, “In a democracy, you cannot stop anyone from joining any party. I think we should now focus on strengthening the party through proper ‘prashikshan’ (training) to look forward.”
In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP despatched shockwaves by the TMC camp by successful a powerful 18 of 42 seats in Bengal.
In the previous 5 years, the saffron social gathering has made vital inroads in West Bengal and beneath the management of Dilip Ghosh it has not solely managed to wrest 18 Lok Sabha seats (up from a mere two in 2014) from the TMC but additionally carried out nicely in almost 51 out of the 144 wards of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation.
The BJP’s evaluation discovered that within the 2019 parliamentary polls, voting patterns prompt that in South and in North Kolkata, the social gathering took the lead in almost 26 wards. This included ward quantity 82 in Chetla, which belongs to mayor Firhad Hakim.
In January 2011, Hakim gained a by-election from Chetla by securing almost 76.82 per cent votes. In 2010, he had gained from the identical ward with almost 72 per cent votes. His victory margin was enormous towards the BJP’s Jiban Sen who may handle solely 11.95 per cent votes.
But within the Lok Sabha elections, Hakim’s social gathering colleague Mala Roy, the Kolkata South candidate, managed to take the lead by round 1,000 votes solely from the Chetla section.
The most vital was Mamata Banerjee’s personal ward quantity 73. As per the 2019 voting patterns, the BJP was forward right here by almost 490 votes.
Similar developments had been additionally seen in ward numbers 58, 85 and 93. While ward quantity 58 is of senior mayor-in-council member Swapan Samaddar, ward numbers 85 and 93 belong to Debasish Kumar and Ratan De, respectively. In all three wards, they did not safe the lead.
At least three borough TMC chairpersons — Sandip Bakshi, Ratan Malakar and Susanta Ghosh — additionally trailed of their respective wards.
Senior TMC chief and social gathering MP Sudip Bandopadhyay additionally trailed in eight of the 11 wards at Jorasanko within the Kolkata North Lok Sabha constituency. In Jadavpur, the ruling TMC trailed in 4 wards within the common elections.
In 2015, Trinamool had gained 11 of the whole 144 wards beneath the KMC. The Left events had gained 15 seats, whereas the BJP and Congress gained seven and 5, respectively.
Polling was held in 91 municipalities throughout the state in 2015 and TMC managed to win 71.
The State Election Commission (SEC), considerably, has drafted an inventory of reservations for the civic polls, indicating that 4 mayor-in-council members — Swapan Samaddar (accountable for setting and bustee improvement), Ratan Dey (roads), Baiswanor Chatterjee (housing) and Debabrata Majumder (stable waste administration) — and two borough chairpersons of the KMC will be unable to contest from their very own wards.
As per the SEC’s draft, eight out of the KMC’s 144 wards have come beneath Scheduled Caste reservation together with three for SC girls. A complete of 45 wards have been reserved for girls within the common class.
On October 1, 2020, the West Bengal BJP demanded speedy intervention of the state ballot panel in conducting the civic elections.
Alleging that the state authorities was deliberately delaying the ballot course of, the social gathering in its letter additionally talked about the Supreme Court order (dated September 22, 2020), which sought the SEC’s opinion on how quickly the pending elections might be performed.
The Calcutta High Court had additionally noticed that the polls ought to be held as quickly as doable.
Leader of the Opposition (LoP) within the state meeting and BJP MLA Suvendu Adhikari stated, “The party will decide how to go for the civic polls, and as far as my strategy is concerned, I will not like to make any comments or reveal anything to the media on this issue right now.”
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