Ab Bangal ki baari hai (Now it is Bengal’s turn) became the theme song of the BJP on Friday after the outcome of the Bihar Assembly elections, which brought a thumping victory for the NDA by surpassing the 200-seat mark.

As soon as the Bihar outcome became clear, with a clean sweep by the BJP and its allies, celebrations began across Bengal. BJP leaders claimed that the neighbouring state’s election results would have a strong impact on next year’s Bengal Assembly polls.

While BJP workers celebrated the Bihar victory at the party’s two offices in Calcutta — 6, Murlidhar Sen Lane, and Sector V in Salt Lake —, the leader of the Opposition, Suvendu Adhikari, organised a festival-like celebration in the Bengal Assembly by hiring a band and distributing sweets among party legislators.

The optics of the celebration confirmed one thing: the BJP’s massive victory in Bihar boosted the morale of the party’s rank and file in Bengal, who had been demoralised since the BJP’s unsuccessful contest in the 2021 Assembly elections.

“Bihar ka jeet hamari hai, ab Bangal ki baari hai (Bihar’s victory is ours; now it is Bengal’s turn). Don’t worry at all. Just as the Bihar election was conducted after the SIR, the election in Bengal will also be conducted with a pure and clean electoral roll,” said Adhikari.

“We will defeat those running a government of misrule, atrocities on women and Hindus, and corruption in job recruitment. What happened in Nandigram in 2021 will be repeated across Bengal in 2026,” added Adhikari.

Apart from Adhikari, major BJP leaders in Bengal, including state president Samik Bhattacharya and his predecessor Sukanta Majumdar, repeated the narrative that the Bihar results would influence Bengal.

Bhattacharya, known for his sarcastic political remarks, posted a photograph of the Kalighat metro station, claiming that the next “stoppage” is Bengal. Kalighat is the residence of chief minister Mamata Banerjee.

“Next station (is Kalighat). The platform is on the left. The massive wave of public support from Bihar will reach West Bengal as well. The people of Bengal want change. They want to be free from the curse of Trinamool politics and want development and employment. Bengal wants to be at the top in India, and that is only possible if the BJP comes to power in 2026,” Bhattacharya wrote on his social media handle.

Although the Bihar results helped BJP leaders and workers flex their muscles, multiple sources in the party and political experts said it would not be easy to compare Bihar and Bengal on the same parameters. They said Bengal BJP leaders would have to conduct a rigorous exercise to replicate the Bihar model in a state where the party faces challenges it did not encounter in Bihar.

First, the mammoth organisation of Trinamool is a challenge for the BJP, whose organisational network is undoubtedly weak in rural pockets. In Bihar, the BJP, jointly with Nitish Kumar’s JDU, had built a robust organisational structure.

Second, Bengal does not have a figure like Nitish Kumar, on whose popularity the BJP could have relied for a sweeping victory. Here, the party has no ally and must fight the mighty Trinamool alone. They have no ally who can have a share in Trinamool’s minority vote bank.

Third, in Bihar, it is believed that the one-time dole of ₹10,000 directly transferred to the bank accounts of 21 lakh women played a significant role in boosting the NDA’s seat count. In Bengal, Mamata Banerjee already has the Lakshmir Bhandar scheme, and she will likely hike the monthly amount before the 2026 polls. The BJP cannot offer Bihar-style direct transfers to women in Bengal without introducing a nationwide policy, which is not feasible for a state-specific election.

Moreover, much of the dole template that the NDA has used in Bihar and other states was a replication of the model that has helped Mamata maintain her winning streak in the state, said a senior BJP leader and asked what else the party would have to offer to the Bengal electorate.

“Apart from Lakshmir Bhandar, schemes like Kanyashree, Sabuj Sathi (under which cycles are distributed among students), or Rupashree (a one-time grant of ₹25,000 to economically weaker families for their daughter’s marriage) are a huge draw among the electorate, particularly women. All that we can do is promise better schemes if we come to power. But for the majority of the electorate, the adage — a bird in hand is worth two in the bush — is what matters. In Bihar, we had our government and that helped the implementation of schemes. That advantage is not there in Bengal,” said the senior BJP leader.

Fourth, caste equations, which played a very significant role in the Bihar elections, do not matter in Bengal’s poll politics.

“Once the euphoria over the Bihar success reduces, the Bengal leadership will have to face these realities and strategise a poll plan that will be in sync with the ground realities. Else, ruling ‘Bongo’ will remain a daydream for the BJP,” the leader added.

Biswanath Chakraborty, a professor of political science at Rabindra Bharati University, raised another question beyond these factors.

“The Bihar election has given stability and strength to the Narendra Modi government. The major question now is whether the Modi-Shah leadership will push strongly into Bengal to defeat Mamata Banerjee. Yes, there are many odds for the Bengal BJP while fighting the mighty Trinamool Congress. But the Bihar results have undoubtedly boosted the BJP’s rank and file ahead of the Bengal elections,” said Chakraborty.

He also believes that the SIR had an impact in Bihar, which is why, although Tejashwi Yadav’s party secured almost the same vote share as in 2020, it ended up with
fewer seats.

“The Congress and the RJD openly opposed the SIR, while the BJP claimed it was a cleansing drive to remove foreigners’ names from the electoral roll. While a section of minority voters supported the RJD, others united behind the NDA. So the RJD’s vote share apparently did not change, but they ended up with fewer seats,” he added.