The rift in the Bengal BJP widened with former State vice-president Jayprakash Majumdar, known for his proximity to former State BJP president Dilip Ghosh and defiant Union Minister Shantanu Thakur, on Tuesday exploded against a section of the State and national leadership hours after he and former State general secretary Ritesh Tewari were suspended from the BJP.
Earlier the two leaders were suspended from the party hours after they were asked to show cause for their alleged anti-party activities. The two leaders were seen attending picnic parties of rebel MLAs organised by Thakur.
Attacking State president Sukanto Majumdar and general secretary Amitava Chakrabarty for making mess of party affairs post its stunning defeat in the last year’s Assembly elections, Jayprakash Majumdar said that “about 80 per cent of the functionaries who took BJP from 4 per cent (vote share) to 40 per cent have been removed from their posts and the self-seeking new comers who had joined the party after 2019, when we got 19 seats, to enjoy the nectar have been placed on top posts… with the result that the party is gradually sinking.”
Alleging that “out of 42 district presidents 32 were unknown to their constituencies … even the State president and the organisational general secretary are only about 2-and-a-half years only in organisational politics,” the suspended leader said, adding, “the voice was of State leaders were suppressed in the party… and after the electoral debacle all the leaders who came from outside Bengal scurried back leaving the grassroots at the mercy of Trinamool Congress men.”
Alleging that “the BJP only resorted to laws suits to counter the violence against the party men as the workers continued to bear the brunt of the ruling party repression… the leadership did not even stand by them… whereas when Mamata Banerjee was the Opposition leader she launched movements against State oppression … she never jettisoned her workers.”