BJP entrusts Sunil Deodhar with saffronising West Bengal in 2021 polls

Kolkata: In yet another major organisational step, the BJP has entrusted Sunil Deodhar, the architect of its electoral success in Tripura, for the party’s preparations for next year’s Assembly polls in West Bengal to utilise his connection with Bengali life.

The Bengali-speaking BJP national secretary, who also eats fish, is in charge of the party in Tripura and Andhra Pradesh at present. He arrived in Kolkata on Monday night. At a BJP meeting in the city on Tuesday, the former RSS functionary was given the charge of Midnapore, one of the five zones in the state party organisation, sources said.

Midnapore zone covers four key districts: Howrah, Hooghly, East and West Midnapore, which are also the stronghold of the ruling Trinamul Congress, which has a majority of MLAs there. The zone came under Union home minister Amit Shah’s review and scrutiny during his visit to the state recently.

Mr Deodhar, sources said, will work in tandem with key strategist Mukul Roy, BJP vice-president, who was credited by Mr Shah for the party’s winning 18 of the state’s 42 Lok Sabha seats last year. 

This is not however the first time that Mr Deodhar will be working in West Bengal. In last year’s Lok Sabha polls, at the eleventh hour he was assigned the job of supervising four Kolkata seats -- Dum Dum, Kolkata North, Kolkata South and Jadavpur -- which were, however, retained by the TMC.

Besides, the BJP has also tasked its MP from Kaushambi, Vinod Sonkar, to handle the Rarh Bengal zone, covering five districts -- Bankura, Purulia, Birbhum, Burdwan East and West; and Rajya Sabha MP Dushyant Kumar Gautam for the Kolkata zone, covering three districts -- Kolkata, North and South 24 Parganas; Basti MP Harish Dwivedi for the North Bengal zone, and BJP national executive member Vinod Tawde of Maharashtra for the Nabadwip zone.