Even as BJP president Amit Shah is fully invested in prepping up his party for the upcoming assembly elections, he knows that his mission to make the BJP a pan India party is far from over. The party chief was in West Bengal in May and September this year to evaluate the party's presence and activities in the state.
Shah will be back in West Bengal on a four-day whirlwind visit in January, once the dust settles over Gujarat assembly elections. The purpose of his visit would be to check the progress made by the party in West Bengal in last four months. “He had given us homework during his last visit. He would see in January what progress we have made so far. It’s all about progress of the party,” said Biswapriya Roychowdhury, West Bengal BJP General Secretary.
Shah had visited in May this year before coming to Kolkata in September. He had then lambasted the state unit for the slow progress of the party in the state, which would face Panchayat elections in 2018 and has to prepare to face the 2019 general election.
Going back to Delhi after his visit in September this year, Shah took a bold decision by drafting Mukul Roy into the party despite objection from the state unit.
May, September and now, in January. Is the plan to visit the state every quarter till general election? “I have no idea. But may be that could be his plan as well,” replies Roychowdhury.
Apart from drafting Roy into the party, Shah has also taken a bold decision by making an Odisha leader the co-observer of the state. Even when Kailash Vijayvargiya, national general secretary of the BJP, is the state in-charge, the placing of Suresh Pujari as the state observer is another master stroke by Shah. The Sambalpur MP is known to be an organisation man who has built the party in Odisha from the scratch.
In the upcoming Sabang by-election in West Midnapore, Pujari would look into the campaign and machinery of the party. Interestingly, Sabang borders Odisha. In a recent party meeting, Roychowdhury said, it has been decided that the party would go all out to snatch the seat from the Trinamool Congress, which has fielded Geeta Bhunia, wife of former Congress MLA from Sabang Manas Bhunia, who recently joined the Trinamool Congress and became a Rajya Sabha MP.
“We will do everything to win the seat. Whatever needs to be done, we will do. We will go to any extent to win the seat,” said Roychowdhury hinting that if Trinamool Congress resorts to violence, his party would also pay back in the same coins.
Shah demanded that the party should have a leader at every booth who would go door-to-door and convince the voters to vote for the BJP. “If we create a leader in every booth who would choose polling agents as well as at least would be able to convince around 500 people to vote for us, we will come to power in West Bengal,” said a state leader.
Sources have confirmed that Pujari has decided to bring some senior leaders from all over India to Sabang for campaign and give the first jerk to the Trinamool Congress. “Talks are on to finalise who will be coming,” said the leader.
Sabang is the seat that neither the Left nor the Trinamool Congress had been able to win despite being in power. It has been a Congress belt. For the first time, it could go out of the Congress hands as the CPI(M) has also fielded a candidate.
