BJP rejigs state panel; Agnimitra Paul & Saumitra Khan removed from posts

KOLKATA: Within 24 hours after Trinamool Congress made a landslide victory in Kolkata Municipal Corporation election, the state BJP revamped its state committee and dropped Sayantan Basu and Raju Banerjee from the panel.

The central leadership has called all the senior leaders, including party's state president Sukanta Majumdar to Delhi to discuss the future course of action and analyse the reason for the party's poll debacle in the recently-held elections in Bengal. BJP national president JP Nadda and union Home minister Amit Shah are likely to be present in the meeting.

Dr Indranil Khan has been made the state Yuba Morcha president. He replaced Saumitra Khan, party's MP. Agnimitra Paul has been removed from the post of president of Mahila Morcha. She will be succeeded by Tanuja Chakraborty. Locket Chatterjee has been made the general secretary. Interestingly, Sayantan Basu, Raju Banerjee and Joyprakash Mazumdar have been dropped. Senior leaders said it had been found that the people did not like their way of talking and body language.

Senior leaders preferring anonymity said an effort had been made to accommodate both the old guards and the new faces and those, who had contacts at the grassroot level and those who would be able to organise political movements against Trinamool Congress. The committee will accommodate leaders from both the districts and the state. There has been massive erosion in BJP's vote bank since the Assembly election.

Though the central leaders had predicted that the party would get more than 200 seats, in reality the party got only 77 seats in the Assembly election. In the four by-elections, the party lost two seats in Dinhata and Shantipur.

In the Kolkata Municipal Corporation election, it got only three seats.