BJP loses Jangalmahal, north Bengal grounds in TMC wave, but Suvendu gets rural poll booster

In the elections to the Gram Panchayats (GPs), the lowest panchayat tier, the TMC won 2,641 out of 3,317 GPs as against the principal Opposition BJP’s tally of 230 GPs.

The BJP put up its best show in Purba Medinipur district – home turf of senior BJP leader and Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the state Assembly Suvendu Adhikari – where it won 61 GPs out of the total 223. In Nadia district, the BJP won 44 GPs out of the total 185.

In Malda district, where the TMC put up its worst performance, the BJP won 15 of the total 146 GPs. In Cooch Behar district, the party won 22 of the total 128 GPs.

In Purulia and Bankura districts, the BJP won 11 and 10 GPs respectively. In rest of the districts in Bengal, the party failed to reach a double digit figure in terms of winning the GPs.

As regards the Panchayat Samitis, the second panchayat tier, the BJP could win only seven out of the total 341 across the state. It was again in Purba Medinipur that the party could win 4 Panchayat Samitis, while winning one each in Nadia, Malda and Hooghly districts.

In the polls the TMC bagged all 20 Zilla Parishads (ZPs), with the BJP and other Opposition parties drawing a blank.

The saffron party managed to win 31 of the total 928 ZP seats across the state, of which 14 came from Purba Medinipur district.

The BJP’s electoral performance indicates that the party has managed to retain its support base in Purba Medinipur district and also to some degree in Malda district.

The BJP has been decimated in Dakshin Dinajpur district – the home turf of the state party president Sukanta Majumdar – where it could win only 4 of the total 64 GPs. The party could not win a single Panchayat Samiti or a ZP seat in the district.

The rural polls saw the BJP losing ground especially in the Jangalmahal and north Bengal regions, which were considered to be its stronghold since the 2019 Lok Sabha polls when the party had won 18 of the total 42 seats in the state. The party had then bagged most of the parliamentary seats from these two regions.

The panchayat poll outcome has thus come as a shot in the arm to Suvendu. Apart from filing petitions in the Calcutta High Court over several aspects of the rural elections, he has been able to retain its hold significantly in his district in the panchayat polls.

The BJP, however, refused to give much importance to these election results which, the party claimed, did not reflect the “true mandate of the people”.

“It was clear from the beginning that TMC will win. They indulged in rampant electoral malpractices and unleashed a reign of terror in the state. The election was not held in a free and fair manner. Therefore, this is not the true reflection of people’s mandate,” Suvendu charged.

On its part, the TMC took a dig at Suvendu for having “failed” to put up a fight in the rural polls. “Suvendu has now become a block-level leader. He cannot even win panchayat election for his party. The same person had been making chest-thumping gestures till now saying he defeated Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee from Nandigram in 2021 Assembly election with a margin of 1,956 votes. In terms of Assembly election results, TMC got a lead of more than 10,000 votes from Nandigram in panchayat election. Where is he hiding now?” asked TMC state general secretary Kunal Ghosh.