BJP rules out NCPI alliance, to contest all 209 wards in Kolkata civic polls

Dr Sukanta Majumder said BJP will contest in all the 209 municipal wards alone in the upcoming Kolkata civic body elections.

KOLKATA: Rubbishing the speculation about electoral alliance with the Nationalist Citizens Party of India (NCPI), BJP alone to field its candidates in all the 209 wards in the upcoming Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) elections.

The municipal polls in seven civic bodies, including KMC and Howrah Municipal Corporation (HMC), in West Bengal are expected to be held during the end of November.

Dr Sukanta Majumder, former Bengal BJP president and union minister of state for education, while speaking to reporters on Saturday, said, "BJP will contest in all the 209 municipal wards alone in the upcoming Kolkata civic body elections." The saffron party's central leadership has given Dr Majumder as the prime observer for KMC elections.

BJP's central observer for Bengal Sunil Bansal held a meeting in the city with the party's state leadership on Saturday to chalk out strategy for the ensuing elections in the seven out of around 110 municipal bodies across the state.

The sitting Bengal BJP president Samik Bhattacharya has already announced that the party would fight the KMC polls alone. "BJP alone has formed its maiden government in Bengal in the assembly elections. We have come to power without any alliance. We will form municipal boards in both Kolkata and Howrah."

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"I have no such information and the party does not know anything about it," he said while reporters told him that several former Trinamool Congress councillors were eager to contest Kolkata civic polls with BJP tickets. Speculation has been flying around the Bengal politics that the ruling party may head for an electoral understanding with the NCPI in the coming elections in the seven civic bodies.

The speculation got intensified after 20 rebel Trinamool Congress MPs, including Sudip Banerjee, Kakoli Ghosh Dastider, Satabdi Roy, Mala Roy, Sayani Ghosh and Partha Bhowmick, joined the NCPI showing their issue-based support to the BJP-led NDA in the parliament.

Many close associates of these 20 rebel MPs belonging to both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha are in regular touch with the Bengal BJP leadership seeking tickets for the KMC elections. Bansal came to Kolkata at the backdrop against such speculation and sat on a meeting with the state unit of the party.

Dr Majumder, saffron party MP from Balurghat, made it clear saying, "No electoral alliance with anybody. We will nominate our candidates from each ward in the KMC polls".

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According to the BJP insiders, the party may announce its list of candidates by the end of this month for KMC and HMC polls. After suffering a crushing defeat to the BJP in the assembly elections held in April in the state, the Trinamool Congress has been grappling with unprecedented internal crisis triggered by a split within the former ruling party.

Two factions - one belonging to Mamata Banerjee, former Chief Minister, while the other led by rebel MLA Ritabrata Banerjee camp - were formed. With support of more than 60 rebel MLAs, Ritabrata was made as the Leader of the Opposition in the West Bengal Legislative Assembly.

The Ritabrata camp, which has already formed Democratic Trinamool Congress, contested bypolls held recently in Nandigram and Rejinagar assembly constituencies. The name of the new party led by Mamata Banerjee is All India Mamata Trinamool Congress.