BJP starts 3-day strategy meet at Kolkata resort; Mamata questions ‘money spent’ – Hindustan Times

With eyes on the 2023 panchayat polls, the West Bengal unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) started a three-day strategy meet at a luxury resort on the eastern outskirts of Kolkata on Monday under the watch of central leaders from Delhi even as chief minister Mamata Banerjee raised questions over the money being spent by the saffron camp.

Called to attend 15 sessions to be held till Wednesday afternoon on various topics, the 350-odd delegates from Kolkata and the districts have been asked not to leave the resort till the event is over, BJP leaders said. Private security agencies have been deployed to ensure security and keep out the media, the leaders added.

Sunil Bansal, BJP national general secretary and observer for Bengal, and Amit Malviya, head of the party’s national information and technology (IT) cell are overseeing the proceedings.

“The meet is being held to evaluate the party’s performance and formulate a strategy for the next panchayat polls,” said Bengal BJP chief spokesperson Samik Bhattacharya.

Meanwhile, chief minister Mamata Banerjee, while addressing Trinamool Congress (TMC) youth front workers in Kolkata, raised questions over the money being spent by the saffron camp.

“They are spending crores of rupees on what they call chintan baithak. What will it achieve?” Banerjee said at the rally.

“The BJP spends money on its workers. Our discussions will certainly not include topics on how to run coal and cow smuggling operations,” Bhattacharya shot back, referring to the ongoing investigations by federal agencies in which prominent TMC leaders are prime suspects.

A few BJP leaders said on condition of anonymity that apart from formulating strategies for the panchayat polls, the leadership will also discuss organisational weaknesses in every district and also address differences in the ranks that continue to trouble the state unit.

“The meet is being held at the resort because it is big enough to accommodate more than 300 delegates. They will live like members of a family for three days,” said former state BJP president Rahul Sinha.

The BJP also recently decided that its central leaders and unions ministers will monitor organisational committees at polling booth level in Bengal till the 2024 Lok Sabha polls are over so that weaknesses can be addressed on time.

Leaders aware of the developments said at least three Union ministers – Dharmendra Pradhan, Bhupendra Yadav and Smriti Irani – are likely to be entrusted with the task of monitoring the activities of booth-level committees.

Although the BJP set a record by winning 18 of the 42 Lok Sabha seats in Bengal in 2019, an internal assessment has indicated that this tally may come down in 2024 since the party could not retain its support base in the assembly polls in 2021.

A post-poll scrutiny showed that many booth committees existed only on paper.

Considered the weakest among the BJP’s organisational committees in Bengal, the booth committees had been in focus since the 2021 assembly polls and by-polls in which the saffron camp could bag only 75 of Bengal’s 294 seats against the TMC’s tally of 217. The BJP’s strength in the assembly has effectively come down to 70 since five legislators have switched over to the TMC without officially resigning from the BJP.

The BJP wants to focus on not only the 18 Lok Sabha seats it represents but also at least 19 of the remaining 24, leaders said.