The meeting between chief minister Suvendu Adhikari and Gorkha Janmukti Morcha president Bimal Gurung scheduled for Monday in Calcutta was “postponed” on Sunday night.

“The meeting between the chief minister and our (Morcha) president was scheduled for 5 pm today. However, we received a message around 10.30pm last night that the meeting was being postponed following the Falta election result and other pressing commitments,” said Roshan Giri, the Morcha general secretary and Gurung’s
long-time aide.

Gurung, who was in Mirik on Monday, told a media conference that the meeting was postponed because the political leadership was busy with forming the cabinet.

The Morcha is presently an ally of the BJP. Its youth president, Noman Rai, contested and won on a BJP ticket from Darjeeling.

In the three Assembly seats of the Darjeeling hills, BJP candidates ensured a clean sweep. The BJP nominated its own candidates for Kalimpong and Kurseong.

After the BJP’s victory in Darjeeling and a BJP government in Bengal, Gurung, who was forced to lie low politically, is looking for a resurgence in hill politics.

Gurung reportedly told a gathering of party workers recently that Union home minister Amit Shah wanted to see him “heading the hills”. The speech was widely circulated on social media.

Gurung had also announced a gherao of Lal Khoti, the headquarters of Gorkhaland Territorial Administration (GTA), to protest against the alleged corruption in the hill body. However, not many in the hills were happy with the return of the “gherao politics”. Gurung later postponed the gherao.

The hill leader has also been talking of an arrangement similar to the Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR). “This has been discussed with Union home minister Amit Shah,” he recently said.

The BTR is under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution. The Sixth Schedule of the Constitution grants indigenous and tribal areas significant autonomy to preserve their language, culture and land rights.

In the hills, there is a demand for inclusion of 11 hill communities in the Scheduled Tribe list. As of now, around 32 per cent of hill populations are tribals. The inclusion of 11 communities will increase the percentage to over 80.