BJP leaders have termed his entry as a ‘trailer’ as many more from the TMC are expected to follow suit.
New Delhi: The entry of Sovan Chatterjee, a once-close aide of Mamata Banerjee and senior Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader, into the Bharatiya Janata Party earlier this week, has given a fresh lease of life into the West Bengal BJP. This follows a series of setbacks the party faced in the last one month. Senior BJP leaders have termed Chatterjee’s entry a “trailer”, as they say many more from the TMC will follow suit.
The entry of Sovan Chatterjee is being looked at with great enthusiasm within the BJP’s Bengal unit, since he brings with him years of experience of elections and governance. Chatterjee had remained a two-time Mayor of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation and has held important Cabinet portfolios in the Mamata Banerjee government in Bengal.
He was also the District President of the TMC for South 24 Parganas district and by virtue of being one of Mamata Banerjee’s closest aides and one of the founding members of the TMC, he is also believed to have been one of the key strategists for Mamata Banerjee’s victory in the 2011 Assembly elections.
BJP leaders believe that his experience and knowledge of Bengal and South 24 Parganas, where he had remained president for a very long time, would be very crucial and beneficial for the party.
Dilip Ghosh, president of BJP’s Bengal unit, told The Sunday Guardian, “We welcome Sovan Chatterjee into the party and I am sure his experience and expertise will help the BJP in Bengal. We are organisationally weak in South 24 Parganas and with Sovan Chatterjee now being in the BJP, I am sure we would be able to strengthen our organisation in that district. We are also hopeful that now we will also be able to win the Kolkata Municipal Corporation elections due next year as he knows Kolkata better than anybody.”
The BJP did not win a single seat from the South 24 Parganas district in the recently concluded Lok Sabha polls. The district has five Lok Sabha seats and 31 Assembly seats. However, BJP leaders believe that Sovan Chatterjee’s entry would help the party establish its base in the region and, according to sources, soon after Chatterjee joining the BJP, some MLAs from the district have already started to make contact with the BJP leadership.
“This is a trailer; you wait and see what is going to happen in Bengal. The TMC will be decimated in Bengal. There are many leaders who are in touch with the BJP leadership and it is just a matter of time when you will see all these leaders flocking to the BJP,” Dilip Ghosh added.
Among the TMC leaders who could soon join the BJP’s Bengal unit is former Bidhan Nagar Mayor and TMC MLA Sabyasachi Dutta.
According to sources, Dutta has been in constant touch with the BJP since the Lok Sabha elections and has had several rounds of meeting with senior leaders of the BJP. He had also been camping in Delhi since Friday and, according to sources, he has met some senior BJP leaders in Delhi to finalise his joining the BJP.
However, Sabyasachi Dutta said that he has been travelling to Delhi due to some personal work. It is to be noted that soon after the Lok Sabha elections, a no-confidence motion had been brought against Sabyasachi Dutta by his own party (TMC) councillors while he was the mayor of Bidhannagar Municipality and senior TMC leaders had expressed dissatisfaction with Dutta several times in the last few months.
Some other leaders like actor-turned-politician and TMC MLA Deboshree Roy could also turn to the BJP. Roy is an MLA from Raidighi in South 24 Parganas and was seen in the BJP’s headquarters in Delhi earlier this week. Sources said that she had come to meet some senior leaders of the BJP in Delhi and her joining the party is also a matter of time.
However, several attempts to contact Roy for her comments did not yield any results till the time of going to press.