Calcutta, Sept. 11: BJP national president Amit Shah today told the party's Bengal unit to build an "active and self-reliant" organisational force instead of complaining to the national leadership against the Trinamul Congress's alleged strong-arm tactics.
Shah, on a three-day visit to the state, spent the day conducting a string of meetings with state and district leaders. He was believed to have expressed his "unhappiness" with the way the party organisation has been functioning in Bengal.
"Amitji has asked us to develop a self-reliant organisation that is able to defend, withstand and combat political violence in the state," state BJP president Dilip Ghosh said on the sidelines of one of the meetings at the Indian Centre for Cultural Relations on Ho Chi Minh Sarani.
BJP leaders who attended the meetings said Shah was not in a mood to take "excuses" for the lapses.
"Instead of running to the national leadership or the governor or the media with complaints against Trinamul and its government, instead of always playing the victim card, Prabhariji (Shah) wants us to step up, resist and even give it back," said a source.
"He seemed to suggest tit-for-tat and wants the state wing to fight its own battles.... He said politics in India is never free of violence and intimidation," he added.
A state BJP functionary said Shah wasn't too pleased with the state unit's lacklustre performance against the targets he had set during his April visit, when he coined the slogan Ebar Bangla (This time, Bengal).
He said the national president did not take kindly to the state unit's inability to cover over half of the 77,000-odd booths in the state, under the Vistarak Yojna - a mass outreach campaign.#Sources said Shah invited suggestions from the state and district leaders, which were noted down by his own team of IT cell convenor Amit Malviya, projects convenor Arvind Menon and national general secretary Bhupendra Yadav.
"The BJP is the single-largest party in both the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha, but it is yet to attain the point of saturation. Once we wrest power in Bengal, I would consider touching the sky," Shah was quoted as saying by a senior BJP functionary.
Shah reportedly went on to set fresh targets for the party in Bengal, asking every active member to take charge of two booths each and the state leadership to identify the purported 40-odd lakh people who have expressed support for the party (by seeking membership through phonecalls or online subscription).
"By the end of October, we have to identify 40 lakh dormant members and turn them into proactive activists. In November, at least five new members have to be found in every booth," said a BJP vice-president.
To take stock, Shah would visit the state for a similar exercise in the second half of January 2018.
Shah, according to the state vice-president, told the Bengal unit to ensure 1.5 crore votes for the party and promised a rerun of the Uttar Pradesh trouncing for Trinamul in Bengal. In the Assembly elections of 2016, Bengal had a little over 6.55 crore voters in total, 2.45 crore of whom voted for Trinamul, while the Left-Congress combine secured over 2.15 crore votes. The BJP bagged around 55 lakh votes.
Sources said Shah did not make any long speech and restricted the meetings to small interactions. He reportedly took detailed feedback from party workers, including the progress of various central schemes.
During one of the meetings, Shah asked the state leaders to list the occasions the national leadership has directed them to observe - mainly birth and death anniversaries of the people the party considers to be its icons.
"Not one of them, not even the state president, was able to answer correctly.... Amitji was definitely not impressed," said a state committee member.
Tomorrow, Shah is likely to start his day with several organisational meetings, followed by lunch with families of "victims" of Trinamul-backed violence. After that, following another round of organisational meetings, he would interact with editors and journalists over tea. Post dinner, he would hold more organisational meetings.
