Amid speculation about the BJP’s chief ministerial face in the West Bengal Assembly polls, state BJP president Samik Bhattacharya said the party has not taken any decision on the matter and will instead seek votes on behalf of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his “development agenda”.
Mr. Bhattacharya said the BJP does not distinguish between “organic” and “inorganic” leaders and that “whoever people identify as fighters against TMC’s misrule can be the face of the party after it wins the polls”.
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Presenting the assembly polls as a direct BJP fight against Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and the TMC’s “politics of appeasement”, Mr Bhattacharya said the party would not project any face of the CM and would instead seek votes in the name of Modi and his “development agenda” and would also pursue a policy of “unmasking”, holding back and retaining power.
Speaking to PTI, Bhattacharya refused to give a direct answer on whether the BJP’s decision to field Leader of Opposition Suvenda Adhikari from both Nandigram and Bhabanipur was projecting him as the party’s chief ministerial candidate.
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“BJP is not projecting anyone as chief ministerial candidate. In Delhi and Haryana, who did the BJP project as a face? We didn’t. Yet we won. The same happened in Odisha. Who did we project as a face? We did not fight those elections with a single face,” he said.
When pressed on whether Mr Adhikari’s candidature from Mamata Banerjee’s pocket district Bhabanipur actually made him the face of the BJP in the elections, Mr Bhattacharya said the leadership decision would rest entirely with the Parliamentary Board and the party’s central leadership.
“If in the next few days they decide to pick someone and fight under that person, then that will be their decision. But at the moment there is no such decision and I don’t think there will be,” he said.
The BJP, he said, would instead seek votes on behalf of Modi.
“We are contesting the election by projecting Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘vikas purush’ – the man of development – trusted by people from Kashmir to Kanyakumari and seeking votes based on faith in his vision,” Mr. Bhattacharya said.
But he left a small window open, saying top management may take another call later.
The BJP leader said his party would secure a “comfortable majority” in the election, but declined to specify numbers or say whether it would cross the two-thirds mark.
Mr. Bhattacharya made it clear that the decision to field Mr. Adhikari in Bhabanipur was intended as a direct challenge to Ms. Banerjee on her home turf.
“Everybody can understand it. It’s a direct challenge,” he said.
Recalling the fierce political battle between Ms Banerjee and Mr Adhikari in Nandigram in 2021, Mr Bhattacharya said the BJP wanted to test the TMC’s claim that Banerjee had lost there only because of “load shedding”.
“The Leader of the Opposition has been suspended from the assembly for a total of 11 months in the last five years. His family was attacked. His victory was called ‘victory in load shedding’. Even then we said: if you think we won in Nandigram because of load shedding, then show your strength by taking leadership in this segment in the Lok Sabha elections. They could not take leadership there,” he said.
Mr. Bhattacharya, who laid out the BJP’s priorities should it come to power, said the first task would be to establish the rule of law.
“First, establish rule of law in the state. Second, ensure that there is no post-election violence because we believe that after the TMC loses power, its workers will start killing each other. We don’t want that. Third, create an investment-friendly atmosphere,” he said.
On infiltration, which he described as the “core issue of the BJP”, Mr Bhattacharya said the party’s policy would be simple: “Detect, apprehend, deport the infiltrators from West Bengal”.
He has repeatedly described this month’s election not only as a contest between the BJP and the ruling TMC, but as a decisive civilizational battle not only for the “existence of Bengali Hindus but also for nationalist, rational Muslims”.
Mr Bhattacharya also sought to refute allegations that the BJP was trying to impose ‘Hindi-Hindu-Hindustan’ and vegetarian culture on West Bengal.
“Bengalis cannot live without fish. Syama Prasad Mookerjee’s party does not have to prove whether we are Bengalis or not,” he said.
Making a belligerent allusion to the alleged assault on judicial officials involved in the SIR in Malda, Mr. Bhattacharya said he still had faith in the ECI to ensure free and fair polls in the state.
“It is a commitment from them (EC) to hold free, fair and bloodless elections. Constitutional authority is being challenged in West Bengal right now. I think the guardians of the constitution should intervene immediately,” he said.
Bhattacharya dismissed Ms Banerjee’s claim that the BJP wanted to impose President’s rule in the state and said the party could have done it years ago if it had wanted to.
“If the BJP wanted to introduce President’s rule, this government itself could have been removed seven years earlier. But we do not support it in principle. Mamata Banerjee will be defeated by the people’s vote,” he said.
Bhattacharya told Muslims, who make up nearly 30% of the electorate and have barely voted for the saffron camp in the last few polls, with the BJP’s message to “enter the mainstream of national life”, educate children and reject the politics of appeasement.
Published – 05 Apr 2026 12:39 IST
