The BJP's nationwide campaign to meet eminent citizens is apparently exposing discord among party leaders in West Bengal. Three senior leaders—state unit president Dilip Ghosh, Mukul Roy and national secretary Rahul Sinha—are seemingly at loggerheads on who would take centre stage to come upfront and meet eminent citizens of Kolkata as part of the BJP's 'Sampark for Samarthan' campaign.
The BJP claims there is no 'lottery' system to decide which leader meets people. But, last week, the matter took a nasty turn when Roy was supposed to meet legendary actor Soumitra Chatterjee, but it was Sinha who rushed to the actor's South Kolkata residence instead.
Unfortunately for the BJP, Chatterjee, known to be a Marxist intellectual, opened up on the Narendra Modi government's demonetisation move when Sinha asked him which work of Modi he liked or disliked.
"I am not a political observer and don't like to comment always on political issues. But I did not like demonetisation, which brought huge hazards for common people," said Chatterjee.
Roy reportedly flagged the incident with the party's central leadership and complained about the state BJP leadership. He went to Delhi soon afterwards and asked senior leaders how could Sinha, instead of him as scheduled, go to meet Chatterjee. Sinha also met many other intellectuals who are mostly left leaning.
Sinha rubbished the allegations that he went to meet people on his own.
"It's the party's work, which we would all have to do together. There is nothing like me or any other person," said Sinha.
Sinha also went to meet a renowned folk singer of West Bengal who threw a question at him:
"Have you ever been able to listen to any of my songs?" This time, Sinha passed the examination by answering the question!
There are a large number of intellectuals in West Bengal the BJP leaders wanted to meet, but many of them reportedly refused to give appointments.
Ghosh denied such reports, saying, "We will meet all and try to meet the expectation of our party president when he would visit later this month."
However, Sinha landed in a soup again on Tuesday when he took his mission to meet intellectuals to the house of state Governor Keshari Nath Tripathi, who was a former senior BJP leader and RSS ideologue. He gave the governor a booklet outlining the work done by Modi government in the last four years.
One BJP leader mocked Sinha and said, "Did someone tell him that governor should not be part of that list of intellectuals? The idea of the party, by doing this, is to bring non-voters to our vote banks. How come the governor falls into that category?"
With such turbulence in the state BJP, Roy is visiting Delhi frequently. Sources said he has decided to tell the BJP leadership in Delhi about the fracas in the state BJP. Roy, however, remains tight-lipped about it.