Before registering a landslide win in the recent Bihar Assembly elections, the BJP had taken a hard stance over the Election Commission (EC)’s Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls, claiming that the exercise would root out “infiltrators”, including those from Bangladesh, even as the Opposition alleged that Muslims were being targeted for deletions.
But as the EC undertakes its SIR exercise in other states including West Bengal, the BJP in Bengal has taken a softer position, saying the party is “not against rashtravadi (nationalistic) Muslims”.
In Bihar, the NDA won 202 of the state’s 243 seats because of dominant performances from the BJP and the Nitish Kumar-led Janata Dal (United) on the back of the incumbent coalition’s caste arithmetic among other factors. However, in Bengal, where the Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress (TMC) has been in power since 2011, the BJP has struggled to make significant inroads in recent elections, though the Bihar outcome has come as a boost for the party ahead of the 2026 Bengal Assembly polls.
“In Bengal, a different formula will be needed since caste politics is not a dominant issue and polarisation is not as widespread as in other states. The BJP, therefore, will balance regional and religious equations. In Bihar, this time, the BJP got Muslim votes and that makes us confident of winning votes in Bengal also,” a senior BJP leader said.
“The Muslim population in Bengal is around 30%. It is true that Muslim are only dominant in 40-50 seats (of the total 294 seats) in Bengal, which we can overlook. But in many other seats, Muslims are not the majority but have a deciding percentage of voters who we completely lost in the 2021 Assembly and 2024 Lok Sabha elections. But this time, we don’t want to lose that,” he said.
As per the 2011 Census, Muslims account for 27% of Bengal’s population, while Hindus make up 70.5%.
“We are targeting those sections of minority voters who are, for many reasons, now against the TMC. We are desperately trying to get such votes that generally go to CPI(M)-Congress to the benefit of the TMC. This time, that will not happen,” the BJP leader said.
The BJP’s changing strategy can be partly attributed to the new state party chief, Samik Bhattacharya, who had recently said, “Think how Muslims in Gujarat, Maharashtra are doing. In the last three years, most of the deaths due to political violence in Bengal are of Muslims. Muslims are killing Muslims. This is the picture. This picture is absent in any other state of India, be it Gujarat or Uttar Pradesh. For how long will you listen to the stories of mandir and masjid? That’s an old story.”
Even senior BJP leader and Leader of the Opposition in the Bengal Assembly, Suvendu Adhikari, has also softened his pitch for Hindu consolidation in an attempt to counter the TMC’s claims that the BJP is “anti-Muslim”.
After the arrest of Chinmoy Krishna Das, a Hindu monk, in Bangladesh in November 2024, the Bengal BJP led by Adhikari had organised several rallies in support of “Sanatani Hindus”. Claiming that Hindus in Bengal were “not united”, Adhikari had said, “In Uttar Pradesh, Hindus have united under Yogi Adityanath ji… In Haryana, Hindus have united… In Maharashtra, the land of Chhatrapati Shivaji, Hindus have united.”
Since then, Adhikari’s rhetoric became sharper, with the BJP portraying Mamata and the TMC as “anti-Hindu”. Adhikari also claimed that the BJP would come to power in Bengal after the 2026 elections and “oust Muslim MLAs from the Assembly”.
However, a week after the NDA’s Bihar victory, Adhikari said, “The TMC has created a false narrative and given an impression that the BJP is anti-Muslim. While we are only for the inclusive growth of all communities, we have never seen Muslims as a vote bank. Look at the developmental steps taken for Muslims in BJP-ruled states and in the country. Indian Muslims are supporting the SIR, which aims to exclude only illegal Bangladeshi infiltrators and Rohingya migrants from the voter list.”
A BJP insider said, “We are also making it clear that we are not against rashtravadi Indian Muslims, we are only against infiltrators, jihadis or Rohingyas.”
However, former state BJP chief Rahul Sinha said, “We have never changed our narratives. We always said that those Muslims who love their country, we are not against them.”
The BJP drew flak from both the TMC and the CPI(M) for claiming that it would support “rashtravadi Muslims”.
State CPI(M) secretary Mohammed Salim said, “Who will decide who is rashtravadi? Those who only stand by the BJP are rashtravadi and others are anti-national. This is the principle of the BJP.”
Attacking the BJP, TMC spokesperson Jayprakash Majumder said, “Religion and rashtravadi are a poisonous concoction being prepared by the BJP. How do you say one is rashtravadi and another is not? The BJP has no moral right to label a group of people as rashtravadi or not. First, the BJP divided Hindus and Muslims. Now, they are dividing Muslims into rashtravadi and non-rashtravadi. How much more will they divide people?”