Monday, May 20

Will BJP’s Dhananjay Ghosh Able To Wrest The TMC Bastion Jangipur?

Edited by Hiba Anvar

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has fielded Dhananjay Ghosh as its candidate from the Jangipur constituency which will go to polls in the third phase. Dhananjay is a long-time RSS organiser and thus the party leadership has entrusted him with the Jangipur seat.

Going by the trend, the ruling party has turned Jangipur into its virtual fortress since the 2019 electionsit can be safely said that only a miracle can change the trend this time. 

In 2019, Trinamool Congress candidate Khalilur Rahman, who has been re-nominated by the party, was elected by a massive margin of 2,45,782 votes. The ruling party was also able to maintain its supremacy in the 2021 West Bengal assembly polls as well. In 2021, the Trinamool Congress won all seven assembly constituencies under the Jangipur constituency. The strong wave of the BJP throughout West Bengal has not felt in Jangipur. 

But the ruling party received a minor jolt in the 2023 by-election for the Sarghardigi assembly constituency, one of the seven assembly segments in the Jangipur Lok Sabha. This all occurred when the Left Front supported Congress candidate Bayron Biswas and it resulted in a surprise victory. 

In 2019 elections, Trinamool Congress, BJP, Congress and CPI(M) had all fielded their candidates. However, this time Left Front-backed Congress candidate Mortaza Hossain and BJP’s Dhananjay Ghosh are contesting against Trinamool’s Khalilur Rahman.

Meanwhile, the Jangipur constituency has earned a negative tag for recording the maximum cases of poll-related violence. This mainly occurred during the panchayat elections.