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Bharatiya Janata Party's Rajya Sabha MP, Samik Bhattacharya, was unanimously elected as the party's West Bengal president on Thursday, succeeding Union Minister Sukanta Majumdar.
The election of the new state president comes as the party looks to challenge the incumbent Trinamool Congress in the upcoming 2026 Assembly polls in the state. Bhattacharya is a former West Bengal Assembly MLA from the Basirhat constituency from 2014 to 2016 and was elected as a Rajya Sabha MP representing the state from April 2024. The new state president has succeeded Union Minister Sukanta Majumdar, who was elected to his post four years ago, on September 20, 2021. Earlier today, after celebrating the election, Majumdar said that this election is the start of a "continuous relay race," and expressed confidence in "uprooting" the Mamata Banerjee-led government in the next election. "This is a continuous relay race... Earlier, the fight used to occur under my leadership; now the fight will take place under the leadership of a new president... We will continue to fight to uproot Mamata Banerjee's government," he said. Multiple party leaders, including Sunil Bansal, MP Ravi Shankar Prasad, LoP Suvendu Adhikari, Union Minister Sukanta Majumdar, Amit Malviya, and Mangal Pandey, attended the ceremony, which took place in Kolkata's Science City. BJP MP Ravi Shankar Prasad was appointed as the Election In-charge to oversee the Bengal BJP president election, as he announced the name of the new West Bengal BJP state president today. No other person had filed their nomination for the post before the deadline of July 2 (Wednesday) for submitting applications; therefore, Bhattacharya was unanimously elected. West Bengal elections are expected to happen in 2026; however, no official date has been announced yet. Apart from this party election, the BJP has also announced the appointment of new chiefs in seven states and two union territories, as part of the ongoing second phase of its organisational revamp. The party appointed new state chiefs in Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Puducherry, and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. As part of the second phase of its Sangathan Parv (Organisational Drive), the BJP has elected new presidents in a total of seven states and two union territories. With the completion of this phase, the BJP is laying a strong foundation for its central leadership transition and gearing up organizationally for the upcoming state and national elections. (ANI)
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