In an interview on Aaj Tak, Bharatiya Janata Party President Amit Shah has stated that his party will win at least 22 seats in West Bengal. The state is one of the few states in India where the saffron party has failed to register any significant presence over the years. However, the party has been trying to establish itself as a formidable force in Bengal in recent years with an aggressive focus on Mamata Banerjee’s minority appeasement and its own Hindutva agenda.
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, which is regarded as the BJP’s parent organization, has also seen a remarkable rise in popularity in the state in a very short period of time. The RSS has managed to establish 250 new shakhas in Bengal over the past one year. Mamata Banerjee has been feeling the heat as well and she has responded by adopting a ‘Soft Hindutva’ approach by deciding to celebrate Ram Navami this year.
The BJP has dispelled the myth that it’s a ‘Hindi’ party which does not enjoy much popularity among Bengalis by registering a thumping victory in Tripura by demolishing the Left in the recently held Assembly Elections in the North Eastern state. The BJP had failed to save its deposits in all of the seats it had contested in Tripura barring one in 2013 and from that position, the party had staged a meteoric rise in the space of a couple of years. Amit Shah’s declaration that the BJP will win 22 seats in Bengal will certainly worry Mamata Banerjee.
Amit Shah also complimented Yogi Adityanath’s work in Uttar Pradesh in glowing words in the interview and reiterated that the BJP will secure a comfortable majority in the upcoming Karnataka Assembly Elections despite the divisive politics of the Congress.