A group of Trinamool Congress workers in Nadia's Nabadwip voluntarily handed over their party office to the BJP on Monday evening, citing the need to ensure uninterrupted development work in the area.
The unusual gesture captures the deepening crisis confronting Trinamool, which ruled Bengal for 15 years, after the BJP assumed power last month with a brute majority.
Ward No 12 Trinamool president Prabir Kumar Das formally handed over the keys of the party office on Motilal Roy Road to local BJP leader Ayan Biswas, along with furniture and other items.
The office, constructed in 2018 on a plot officially owned by Trinamool, has all necessary legal documents and ownership deeds in the party's name.
While local Trinamool leaders publicly described the move as a gesture made in the interest of development, the decision appeared to underscore the growing despondency among party workers following the party's sharp decline in organisational strength and public support in the area.
According to local sources, the mood within the party unit has dramatically changed since May 4, when the Assembly election results came out.
Soon after the results, unidentified persons partially painted the Trinamool office building in saffron. Then, newly elected BJP MLA Shrutisekhar Goswami, who defeated Trinamool's Pundarikakshya Saha, had the structure repainted white.
Local political observers believe the morale of Trinamool grassroots workers in the area suffered amid the party's deteriorating condition at the state level, the widely discussed public assault on the party's national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee in Sonarpur and the arrest of influential local leader and Nabadwip municipality chairman Biman Krishna Saha.
Explaining the decision to hand over the party office to the BJP, Das said: "An unusual sense of gloom engulfed our party workers with the gradual decline of the leadership. Even a month ago, this office was crowded with people seeking various services. Suddenly, almost all party workers stopped visiting the office. It appeared that many lost interest in politics and no longer believed that Trinamool could bounce back."
"We therefore unanimously decided to hand over the entire office building to the BJP in the larger public interest so that development work in the area does not suffer," Das said.
He rejected suggestions that the move was made under any sort of political pressure. "It is voluntary," Das said, categorically ruling out the possibility of joining the BJP.
Ward 12 BJP leader Ayan Biswas, also secretary of the BJP's Nabadwip South mandal unit, said: "The local Trinamool leadership contacted us and expressed their desire to hand over the party office. We were surprised, but their gesture appeared sincere. Trinamool workers of this locality transferred the keys of their party office because they did not want development work in the ward to be hampered."
"They (Trinamool workers) voluntarily handed over the keys of their party office," Biswas said. "If someday they change their mind, we will return the office along with all their belongings."