With the 2026 West Bengal Assembly elections less than a year away, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has identified 141 constituencies as the core of its battle plan. These are seats where the saffron party was ahead in either the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the 2021 Assembly elections, or the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. The party believes that if it consolidates gains in these constituencies and campaigns with a clear strategy, it could mount a serious challenge to Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress (TMC).
At the heart of this strategy are 52 seats where the BJP was consistently ahead across all three previous elections. Party strategists call these the “most probable” constituencies. In addition, there are seven seats in Purba Medinipur — won after Suvendu Adhikari’s defection from TMC — that turned favourable to the BJP in 2021 and 2024 elections.
Another 47 constituencies are being treated as ‘swing seats’. Of these, the BJP was ahead in 23 in 2019 and 2024 but slipped in 2021. In 12 others, it led in 2019 and 2021 but fell behind in 2024. The party also registered fresh gains in nine seats in 2024, mainly in Purba Medinipur.
“Yet, there are 35 constituencies where BJP’s hold has weakened— seats it led in during 2019 but failed to retain in either 2021 or 2024. These are concentrated largely in South Bengal and pose a major challenge for the party’s expansion plans,” said a senior BJP leader.
The numbers game
The BJP’s best performance in Bengal came in 2019, when it won 18 of 42 Lok Sabha seats with 40.6 per cent vote share and was ahead in 121 Assembly segments out of 294. But its momentum slowed in 2021: despite securing 38.5 pc votes, it won only 77 Assembly seats as TMC’s vote share surged to 48.5 pc.
Analysis of results in past three electoral exercises show the BJP, in 2024, bagged 12 Lok Sabha seats with 39.1 pc of the vote and secured lead in 91 Assembly segments—better than 2021 performance but still below its 2019 peak. The TMC, despite slipping to 46.2 pc, remained comfortably ahead of the BJP. With defections and bypoll setbacks since 2021, BJP’s strength in the Assembly has reduced to 65 seats—far short of the 148 required for a majority.
Strongholds and weak links
Of the BJP’s strongholds, 23 are in North Bengal, including Cooch Behar, Alipurduar, Darjeeling, Jalpaiguri, Dinajpur and Malda. The party has been consistently dominant in these areas across three elections.
In South Bengal, the BJP banks heavily on the Dalit-Matua belt of Nadia and North 24 Parganas, alongside select seats in Hooghly, Purulia, Bankura, West Midnapore and East Midnapore, where Suvendu Adhikari remains the party’s tallest leader.
But cracks are visible. The defection of Alipurduar MP John Barla to TMC and growing resentment among the Matua community — over harassment in BJP-ruled states and confusion surrounding the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) — have unsettled the party’s calculations. Recent bypoll losses in Bagda and Ranaghat South have deepened concerns.
The swing factor
The BJP’s list of “swing seats” includes several constituencies with a large Muslim population, such as Karandighi, Raiganj, Manikchak, Vaishnavnagar, Jangipur and Barayan. In 2019 and 2024, BJP gained from a split in Muslim votes between TMC and the Left-Congress combine. But as seen in 2021, consolidation of Muslim votes behind TMC could again put the saffron party at a disadvantage.
Meanwhile, BJP leaders are eyeing urban anger against corruption and unemployment in Kolkata and its surroundings, hoping to make inroads where the party has never been ahead before. Recognising the need to prevent anti-establishment votes from drifting to the Left, state BJP leaders have sharpened their attacks on the Left-Congress bloc.
The road ahead
The BJP’s vote share in Bengal has remained steady between 38–40 pc across three major elections, but TMC’s share has consistently been higher, between 44–48 pc. Without a popular state-level face against Mamata Banerjee, the BJP will rely on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s campaign and national issues such as infiltration and corruption to tilt the balance.
However, with its own ranks shaken by defections and community discontent, BJP’s path to the 148-seat majority mark looks steep. A senior state leader admitted, “We have a high chance in about 100–110 seats. The rest will depend on polarisation, anti-incumbency and whether we can convince voters we are the real alternative.”
For now, the BJP’s ‘141-seat bird’s eye plan’ represents both its ambition and its challenge: consolidating strongholds while breaking through in swing territories to script history in Bengal’s political battlefield.
Also read: Drama in Bengal Assembly, BJP-TMC trade barbs; 5 MLAs suspended
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