Kolkata: Chandra Kumar Bose has resigned from the Bharatiya Janata Party three years after he was dropped as its West Bengal vice-president, saying his “inclusive ideology” did not match with the party’s.
In his resignation letter to BJP national president J.P. Nadda, Bose said the party needed to focus not only on Bengali-Hindu voters but also on the state’s Muslim voters, who have a strong influence.
The letter, seen by ThePrint, has also been written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah.
The grandson of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, who had joined the BJP in 2016, was dropped as vice-president of the party’s Bengal unit in 2020 after his criticism of the controversial Citizenship Amendment Act.
Bose wrote in the letter, “I had put forward a detailed proposal suggesting the Bengal strategy to reach out to the people of Bengal. My proposals were ignored. In view of these unfortunate circumstances, it has become impossible for me to continue as a member of the BJP.”
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Bose told ThePrint that when he joined the BJP, he was promised that he would be given the opportunity to propagate the ideas of Netaji and his brother Sarat Chandra Bose, but that did not happen.
He said, “My ideology and the ideology of the party do not match. Netaji and Sarat Chandra fought against divisive politics. He was in favor of secularism and inclusiveness.
On its part, the BJP says that Bose’s resignation will not have much impact on the party.
BJP spokesperson Samik Bhattacharya said that Bose was not very active in the party. Bhattacharya told ThePrint, “In the time of Chandrayaan, you are talking about Chandra Bose. While he was with the party, now his absence will be official.”
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‘Failed to feel the pulse of the people’
Bose’s induction in 2016 was seen as a major boost for the BJP, especially given Netaji’s popularity in West Bengal. That year, Bose contested the state elections from Bhawanipur against Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and lost.
In 2019, he lost the South Kolkata parliamentary seat to Trinamool Congress’s Mala Roy.
Since being removed as BJP vice president in 2020, Bose has largely kept a low-profile. He was not given a ticket to contest in the highly contested 2021 assembly elections.
In his letter, the leader said that he had suggested a strategy after the BJP lost the elections to TMC, but it was never implemented.
He wrote to the BJP president, “I suggest that the BJP follows an inclusive ideology to embrace all communities and different sections of the society. TMC’s appeasement politics cannot be countered by polarization. “To achieve the desired results, BJP will have to penetrate the intellectual and middle class Bengali voters.”
He said that BJP could not win any assembly seat in and around Kolkata because we failed to understand the pulse of the people and understand their stand.
In the assembly by-elections, BJP could not even save the deposit on 3 seats and lost all the four seats by a huge margin.
Highlighting PM Modi’s tagline “Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas, Sabka Vishwas, Sabka Prayas”, Bose said the West Bengal BJP needs a “respectable, cultured and honest leader who has universal acceptability among Bengalis and other communities”. yes.”
“Such a leader will confidently inspire existing leaders and workers across the state to enhance booth level organization for effective connectivity with critical voters,” the letter said.
He also suggested that the party should project a leader who could invoke the inclusive ideology of national icons such as Swami Vivekananda, Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, Syama Prasad Mukherjee and Chittaranjan Das.
As a solution, Bose said he suggested a specific region-wise “policy document” for West Bengal, which should be prepared outlining the development projects to be undertaken by the BJP. But he claimed that despite efforts, his suggestions remained on paper.
Significantly, Bose has often praised West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee – for example, in an interview with The Statesman in July, he said that the TMC supremo knows West Bengal well and cares for the people in the state. Understand the challenges ahead.
When ThePrint asked Bose what he plans to do next, he did not comment.
(Editing: Almina Khatoon)
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