In a humiliating turn of events for the Bengal BJP, the party’s candidates for the Chowringhee and Kashipur-Belgachia assembly seats, Shikha Mitra and Tarun Saha, declined to run and even denied any links to the party
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Thursday announced a list of 148 candidates for the upcoming West Bengal assembly elections’ fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth phases. Tarun Saha was named as the party’s nominee for the Kashipur-Belgachia seat, and Shikha Mitra, the wife of late Congress leader Somen Mitra, was named as the party’s candidate for the Chowringhee constituency.
However, in a shocking turn of events, both Saha and Mitra turned down the BJP’s bid to run for the aforementioned seats.
Saha, the husband of Mala Saha, the outgoing Trinamool Congress (TMC) MLA from Kashipur-Belgachia, categorically denied that he will run for the BJP in the upcoming assembly elections. He told reporters that he is a member of the TMC and that the BJP placed him on the list without consulting him.
Mala Saha had consistently retained the TMC’s Kashipur-Belgachia seat in both the 2011 and 2016 state assembly elections. This time, however, the party fielded Kolkata’s outgoing deputy mayor, Atin Ghosh.
Shikha Mitra, the late West Bengal Congress president’s wife, issued a video statement shortly after the BJP’s list was made public. She, too, called the information “false” and categorically denied any involvement with the BJP in the election.
Mitra also played down rumors that she was planning to join the BJP following her meeting with BJP leader and family friend Suvendu Adhikari.
“I got to know from the media that my name has been announced as a BJP candidate. They are completely different from us, how can I join the BJP,” asked Shikha Mitra while also adding that the party leaders have “lost sanity”
Shikha Mitra was elected to the TMC’s Chowringhee constituency in 2011 but later moved to the Congress. Following the resignation of the incumbent MLA, a by-election was held in 2014, with TMC candidate Nayna Bandopadhyay winning. In the forthcoming elections, Bandopadhyay will run for the seat on behalf of the TMC.
The BJP has named five sitting MPs, including a Union minister, as candidates for the state assembly elections. The staff has been protesting the party’s candidate nomination, with many of them clashing with police outside the party’s Hastings office in Kolkata two days ago. According to the news agency PTI, protestors have vandalized party headquarters, threatened central officials, and blocked roads by burning tires in many locations across the province.
