BJP president J P Nadda will address two rallies in West Bengal's Purba Bardhaman and Purba Medinipur districts on Sunday, party sources said. He began his two-day visit to West Bengal on Saturday evening and held a closed-door meeting in Kolkata with the party leaders to review the preparedness for the upcoming panchayat elections in the state, they said.
He had last visited the state on January 19. "During the closed-door organisational meeting, Nadda ji asked the state leaders to fix the gaps and put up a fight against the TMC misrule in the state," a party leader said. On Sunday, Nadda will first visit a Kali temple at Purbasthali in Purba Bardhaman and then address a public meeting at a nearby ground.
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Later in the day, he will address another rally at Kanthi in Purba Medinipur district. Kanthi is the hometown of Leader of Opposition and Nandigram MLA Suvendu Adhikari. The BJP lost both Bardhaman Purba and Kanthi Lok Sabha seats to the Trinamool Congress in the 2019 elections.
Nadda's programmes are a part of the BJP central leadership's 'Pravas' campaign to strengthen its organisation in 144 Lok Sabha seats across the country that the party had lost by a slender margin in the 2019 elections.
Over the next few months, Nadda and Union Home Minister Amit Shah will address 12 rallies each, covering 24 Lok Sabha seats in the state that the party had lost in the last election. The BJP won 18 of the 42 Lok Sabha seats in the state in the 2019 polls.
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The ruling Trinamool Congress, however, declined to attach much importance to Nadda's visit. "As the rural polls are approaching, BJP leaders will be coming more frequently, but these visits will not yield any result. We have seen how the BJP's central leaders had camped in West Bengal before the 2021 assembly polls, but the party faced defeat," TMC spokesperson Kunal Ghosh had said on Friday.
Nadda's visit to West Bengal comes at a time when the party is looking to strengthen its organisational machinery ahead of the panchayat elections. Internal squabbles and defections have plagued the BJP after the 2021 assembly election results were announced.
Former Union minister Babul Supriyo, party MP Arjun Singh and six legislators, including national vice president Mukul Roy, have switched over to the TMC since the 2021 assembly polls. The TMC steamrolled to power for the third consecutive term in 2021, winning 215 assembly seats, while the BJP bagged only 77 seats.
