The Saffron Surge: How BJP became TMC’s main challenger in West Bengal — a ground report

Kolkata, Bangaon: Dinesh Kumar Singh has been driving a taxi for decades in south Kolkata. Engrossed in conversation with fellow drivers at a taxi stand, Singh says he expects a change of guard in West Bengal in the 2026 assembly elections.

“This time TMC will lose,” Singh told this reporter in Kolkata indicating his prediction that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) might win West Bengal Election 2026 ending Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress's three-term rule.

Early trends of counting in West Bengal Elections show a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) surge in the state after 15 years. The BJP has already crossed majority mark of 148 seats as per early trends being streamed on TV channels. The TMC is trailing at 115 seats, as per early trends streamed on TV channels.

Singh, originally from Bihar, says he is wary of post-poll violence—an issue the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) frequently attributes to the ruling Trinamool Congress. “Kamake khane wale ko kya darr” says Singh, in his late fifties. Singh's remarks translate to: "Why should someone who earns an honest living be afraid?”

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) started contesting assembly elections in West Bengal way back in 1882. But the saffron party has never been in power in Bengal, where the political landscape, until very recently, has been dominated by the Left, the Congress, and the TMC.

In the last ten years, however, the BJP has experienced significant growth in West Bengal and emerged as the primary opposition to the Trinamool Congress (TMC) by increasing its vote share and winning substantial seats in 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections. The saffron party won 77 seats in 2021 assembly elections adn became the state's principal opposition party.

The rise of saffron party

The saffron party's rise, experts say, is driven by issues like illegal immigration, the Hindutva agenda, and the promise of development, with projected competitive performance in 2026 assembly polls, the last and final phase of which is scheduled on 29 April.

In ‘Mission Bengal: A Saffron Experiment’, Kolkata-based journalist, Snigdhendu Bhattacharya explains how from being a fringe political party in 2013 to sweeping nearly half of the state's forty-two Lok Sabha seats in 2019, the BJP gained ground in West Bengal, aided partly by its ideological fountainhead Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh’s (RSS) exponential growth during Mamata Banerjee's chief ministerial tenure 2011 onwards.

“The Left lost its ground 2011 onwards and thus created a vacuum. The BJP carried on its consistent and concerted criticism of the TMC and managed to create a strong wave of anti-incumbency aided by its Hindu polarisation,” Bhattacharya told LiveMint in Kolkata.

At the BJP office in Bhabanipur, party workers are confident that the people of the high profile seat and beyond have made up their mind. “People are fed up with TMC's goondagardi, corruption, syndicate. Not just in Bhabanipur, BJP will win across Bengal,” a worker, who did not want to be named, told this reporter.

Elections in Bhabanipur are scheduled for 29 April. Mamata Banerjee, the sitting MLA is up against BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari from here.

The 2019 Milestone

The BJP has not won assembly elections in West Bengal so far. Yet, it achieved a remarkable milestone in 2019 Lok Sabha elections by winning 18 of the 42 parliamentary seats of Bengal, a sharp increase from 2 seats it had won in 2014.

The saffron party’s vote share surged from 17 per cent in 2014 to 40 per cent in 2019. The gap between the BJP and the TMC vote share was just 3 per cent, with the Mamata Banerjee-led party polling 43 per cent vote share, winning 22 seats, 12 fewer than it won during the peak ‘Modi wave’ in 2014.

“The Congress and the Left, once dominant forces, were relegated to near irrelevance, with the TMC and the BJP together commanding an overwhelming 83 per cent of the vote share,” says Sayantan Ghosh, author of ‘Battleground Bengal.’

This polarisation of the electorate, where two parties dominated the vote, underscored a significant realignment of political loyalties in Bengal, says Ghosh.

From Left to Right

About 40 per cent of the voters who had previously supported the Left shifted their allegiance to the BJP, while about 33 per cent moved to the TMC in 2019 Lok Sabha polls, as per a CSDS-Lokniti post-poll survey of 2019 general elections.

“A substantial portion of the traditional voter base of the Left Front and the Congress gravitated towards the BJP in 2019…. That the BJP – a party rooted in majoritarian nationalism and right-wing economic ideas – could attract such a significant segment of the Left’s secular, socialist-leaning electorate is emblematic of a deeper political polarisation at play,” writes Ghosh.

The BJP’s rise has driven by a relentless, high-voltage campaign led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The BJP’s Hindutva narrative consolidated a large chunk of the Hindu vote, resulting in a thirty-six percent in the support for the BJP among Hindu voters from 2014 to 2019.

On 25 April, in one of his many rallies, PM Modi said the high voter turnout reflected public support for the BJP’s call for change and a rejection of what he termed the TMC’s “dictatorship”.

“The TMC's arrogance was shattered in the first round, and the second phase will cement BJP's victory in the state,” Modi said speaking at Matua community citadel of Thakurnagar at Bangaon in North 24 Parganas district of Bengal.

The BJP, however, couldn't sustain its momentum in the 2021 assembly elections. Mamata Banerjee’s TMC won a landslide, defying exit poll predictions, winning 215 seats with 48 per cent vote share. The BJP won 77 seats, three more than it won in the 2016 polls and polled 38 per cent of the votes. The vote share gap between the TMC and the BJP was 10 per cent compared to 3 per cent in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.

From a fringe to TMC’s formidable challenger

In the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, the TMC won 29 seats, seven more than it won in 2019. The BJP won 12, six fewer than in 2019. The vote share difference between the TMC and the BJP was about seven per cent with Mamata Banerjee led party bagging 46.16 per cent votes and the saffron party polling 39.08 per cent in 2024 Lok Sabha polls.

“Once a stronghold of revolutionary red, Bengal now pulses with saffron, as voters, abandoned by the Left turn to the BJP not for ideology but for survival and hope. This shift, rooted in the quest for power and protection, positions the BJP as a formidable challenger to the TMC's dominance, heralding a new era in the state’s political saga where saffron plags increasingly rival the green and white of the ruling party’s citadel,” Ghosh writes.

Tracing BJP's growth in Bengal

Historically, the party's roots in the state trace back to Syama Prasad Mookerjee , a Bengali who founded the Bharatiya Jana Sangh (the BJP's predecessor) in 1951.

-The Jana Sangh had initial success, winning 9 assembly seats in 1952, but its influence waned after Mookerjee's death.

-The BJP contested 52 seats in 1982 assembly polls in Bengal but won none with less than 1 per cent vote share. T

-By 1991, the BJP saw its first modern surge, securing 11.66% of the vote share by campaigning against immigration. Yet no seats won in assembly.

-The saffron party won first seats (3) in 2016 assembly polls when it contested 294 seats. In 2021, the BJP jumped to 77 assembly seats.

-The most significant shift occurred during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, where the BJP won 18 out of 42 seats with a vote share of 40.25%. This marked the first time the party posed a direct, large-scale challenge to the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC).

-The BJP became the official opposition for the first time, increasing its seat count from just 3 in 2016 to 77 seats in state assembly.

-The party's momentum slowed slightly, winning 12 seats with a 38.73% vote share in 2024 general elections, as the TMC reclaimed some lost ground.

Why Bengal Matters for the BJP?

West Bengal has historically leaned toward Left and regional politics. For the BJP, growing here signals that its brand of politics can expand beyond its traditional Hindi heartland base. In order to remain the dominant national party, the BJP needs to keep expanding into new regions, ahead of 2029 Lok Sabha polls.

Shantanu Thakur, Union Minister and BJP MP from Bangaon Lok Sabha says people of West Bengal have realised that the Mamata Banerjee government has been a corrupt regime. “People are fed up with the current dispensation and do not want to see corruption again. That is why people will vote and elect a BJP government in West Bengal this time,” Thakur told this reporter at his ancestral home in Thakurganj in Bangaon

Success in West Bengal assmbly elections would show it can win in culturally and politically distinct states, not just its core bases. Issues like citizenship, migration, and religious identity have given the BJP an entry point to mobilise voters—making Bengal a testing ground for strategies it uses elsewhere, experts said.

Millions of voters, including Dinesh Kumar Singh, will vote in the second and final phase of West Bengal on 29 April. With the West Bengal Assembly election nearing its end, all eyes are on the outcome to be declared today. And if the trends hold, the BJP is on course to finally come to power in Bengal and bring Mamata Banerjee’s rule to an end?