Blame-game begins in WB BJP unit

As the dust settled, a covert blame game has begun in the West Bengal BJP. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the party’s central leadership have emerged as the main target of the West Bengal BJP leaders. Fingers are now being pointed at the Prime Minister’s style of campaigning.

Nerves appeared to be frayed over the apparent “maginalisation” of the local leaders by the heavyweights from Delhi and north India. It was also claimed that both the central and local leadership failed to attract the state’s intelligentsia and Bengali bhadralok in the urban areas following a “sectarian and low level” style of campaigning.

Speaking to this correspondent from Kolkata, a senior BJP leader felt that the first “strategic error” was the failure to bring forth an “effective Bengali leadership” in the state. “Identity crisis” hit the BJP hard as the majority of the rallies, which included that of the Prime Minister and home minister Amit Shah were addressed in Hindi. This helped strengthen Banerjee’s narrative of the “BJP is an outsider”.

The local leaders also questioned the regular visits of the Prime Minister and the camping of the home minister in the state during the elections.

“They behaved like a daily passenger. This gave an impression that if the BJP won, the state government would be run by remote control from Delhi.” Some senior state leaders claimed that this particular impression damaged the BJP among the local intelligentsia and that is “why Mamata Banerjee swept Kolkata, Howrah and North and South 24 Parganas”.