Repeated defeats in by-elections have exposed the rift in the BJP. Senior party leader and former Meghalaya Governor Tathagata Roy has hit out at a section of the party leadership for the recent humiliating defeat.
BJP has Lost all four assembly seats In which voting for the Trinamool Congress was held on October 20 with a huge margin. Mr Roy has taken to social media to express his anger.
“BJP seizes deposits in 3 out of 4: A party that has the potential to form the government in 2021! By handing over West Bengal to TMC, not only is the BJP doomed in West Bengal; The state as a people and Bengali Hindus are also doomed. All three are on a downhill journey from where they will never return..,” Mr Roy tweeted on Wednesday.
The former West Bengal BJP president has been critical of some leaders over the past few months, but his attack has been more direct after the defeat of the bypolls.
“Some people are shocked that I have publicly condemned BJP leaders. I didn’t say a word publicly before the election. I said it inside the party. But after the election setback, when it was seen that no analysis was attempted and on the contrary, “3 to 77” were patting the back… Roy tweeted on Wednesday.
In their tweets and public statements, veteran BJP leaders from Bengal have been saying that it will be a tough task for the BJP leadership in the state. He has made it clear that he did not blame “Narendra Modiji and Amit Shahji” for welcoming unwanted elements to the BJP in West Bengal and that “the responsibility of this debacle will be on the shoulders of the KDSA team”.
The ‘KDSA team’ refers to Kalyash Vijayvargiya, the national general secretary and in-charge of West Bengal; Dilip Ghosh, former state president and national vice president; and BJP leaders Shiv Prakash and Arvind Menon, who had important responsibilities during the state assembly elections. Not only has the BJP lost in the by-elections to all the seven seats held after May 2021, but five elected representatives of the party had switched sides and joined the TMC. TMC defectors included Mukul Roy and Rajiv Banerjee, who joined the BJP with much fanfare ahead of the 2021 assembly elections.
While leaders like Dilip Ghosh have reacted angrily to Mr Roy’s comments, some leaders feel he is raising the right issues. “There are some people who don’t get a chance to speak and they tweet,” Mr. Ghosh said. He also suggested that it was for higher-ups in the party to condemn leaders like Tathagata Roy.
Interestingly, Dilip Ghosh, who was the subject of Mr Roy’s attack, also criticized the attitude of party leaders during the 2021 assembly elections. In a public program in Paschim Medinipur on Wednesday, he said that the central leadership of the party took all the decisions during the elections. The former state BJP president said that many BJP leaders are aspiring to become ministers and were not present at the counting centers at the time of counting.
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