Sunil Bansal (Photo: X handle @sunilbansalbjp)
Kolkata, Nov 29 (IANS) Trinamool Congress leaders -- however influential -- who signal eagerness to join the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on the explicit precondition of being nominated to contest the 2026 West Bengal assembly elections from a favoured constituency will no longer be entertained, party sources said on Saturday.
The BJP central leadership has conveyed clear instructions to the state unit on this count through the party's central observer for West Bengal, Sunil Bansal.
"The instruction from Bansal is simple: any leader from another party who is willing to join the BJP should be welcome only if he or she joins without any precondition. Whether that leader will be fielded in the 2026 state assembly polls will be a decision taken by the party’s central leadership in consultation with the state leadership. But a ticket for the polls cannot be the precondition for joining the BJP under any circumstance," said a state committee member who attended an internal meeting where Bansal issued the directive.
The new approach is reportedly shaped by bitter lessons from the 2021 assembly polls. Several erstwhile Trinamool heavyweights had switched to the BJP ahead of that contest on the expectation that they would be allowed to fight from their chosen seats. After the results, however, many of those who lost returned to the Trinamool Congress, while some winners also went back to the ruling party.
The central leadership has also advised the state unit to be highly selective in recommending celebrities -- particularly film personalities -- as party candidates for the next assembly polls. A state committee member said the central leadership outlined three tests before endorsing any celebrity for candidature.
First, how deeply the proposed celebrity is rooted in the BJP's core political ideology. Second, how well such candidates understand the social and geographic contours of the assembly constituency from which they might be fielded. Third, the extent to which these celebrity nominees are likely to stay engaged with organisational work irrespective of electoral outcome.
The guidance signals the BJP's attempt to avoid repeat scenarios where opportunistic entrants, brought in primarily for electoral calculations, later defect or disengage, undermining the party's local organisation and long-term electoral prospects.
Party functionaries said the directive is intended to ensure that new entrants -- whether seasoned politicians or public figures -- are integrated into a sustained party-building effort rather than being parachuted in as one-off electoral assets.
--IANS
src/pgh
