TMC and BJP focus on doorstep campaign in Bengal poll arena

Both parties are expected to concentrate on doorstep campaigning and spending time with the electors.

The Lok Sabha Pravas campaign of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the panchayat poll drive by the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) will start wooing West Bengal voters from the first week of January, leaders from the opposing camps said on Monday.

Modi may address a rally at Siliguri in northern West Bengal on January 19. (AP)

Both parties are expected to concentrate on doorstep campaigning and spending time with the electors. The BJP has planned for a massive campaign in the state aimed at the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. Prime Minster Narendra Modi, Union home minister Amit Shah and party president J P Nadda will address around 40 public rallies in 2023.

Modi may address a rally at Siliguri in northern West Bengal on January 19. Shah is scheduled to address rallies in two south Bengal districts on January 17, BJP leaders said, seeking anonymity.

While addressing a party workers’ meet in Kolkata, TMC chairperson Mamata Banerjee announced her road map for the panchayat polls to be held in the coming months. “Spend a night at the home of a party worker. Have food with them. I will try to do this as well,” Banerjee said.

Before the 2019 Lok Sabha polls and the 2021 assembly elections, Shah had lunch at the homes of some tribal and Dalit families as part of BJP’s campaign model adopted in other states. Banerjee had earlier alleged that the BJP shipped food from star hotels to those homes so that Shah could pose before the media.

She said on Monday that TMC leaders must have simple home-cooked food. “When I say food, I am talking of simple rice, lentils and curry and nothing fancy,” the chief minister said in her address.

In the 2018 panchayat polls, which saw widespread violence and some 20 murders, TMC bagged around 90% of the seats, of which 34% were uncontested. TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee has said in his recent meetings that there should not be any violence this year, and anybody found intimidating voters or rival candidates will be dealt with strictly.

Around 350 office bearers and elected representatives, including MPs and MLAs, will stay overnight in villages, TMC leaders said, declining to be named. Moreover, 350,000 volunteers will go door-to-door to check whether people are getting the benefits offered by 15 welfare schemes.

The BJP state unit was recently asked by central leaders to hit the road after an internal survey showed the party losing ground in several of the 18 Lok Sabha seats it won in 2019. Rallies under the Pravas campaign will continue throughout the year to reach out to the masses, BJP leaders said.

Suvendu Adhikari, leader of the opposition in the assembly, announced the BJP’s plans at a rally in Howrah district on Monday. “We started holding meetings at polling booth level from December 10. These will continue till January 5,” he said. “After it is over, 100 senior leaders including myself, state president Sukanta Majumdar and others will hold 10 meetings each to cover 1000 gram panchayat areas.”

The BJP has 42 district units in West Bengal. Senior state leaders have been given charge of these units. Adhikari said he is in charge of 11 units.