Bharatiya Janata Party kicks off ‘Paribartan Yatra’ in West Bengal, takes on All India Trinamool Congress ahead of Assembly elections

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will launch its ‘Paribartan Yatra’ across West Bengal on Sunday, aiming to intensify anti-incumbency sentiment against the All India Trinamool Congress (TMC) and test its grassroots strength ahead of this year’s Assembly elections.

The campaign begins a day after the publication of the revised electoral rolls under the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise in the state. During the revision process, around 63.66 lakh names — nearly 8.3 per cent of the electorate — were removed from the voter list since November last year, bringing the total number of voters down to just over 7.04 crore.

The 5,000-km outreach drive is being positioned as both a mass-contact programme and an organisational stress test, designed to convert booth-level groundwork into visible mobilisation on the streets, a party leader said.

Nine separate yatras will set off from Cooch Behar, Krishnanagar, Kulti, Garbeta, Raidighi, Islampur, Hasan, Sandeshkhali and Amta, covering all 294 Assembly constituencies before culminating in a mega rally at the Brigade Parade Ground in Kolkata. The event is expected to be addressed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

During the yatra, the BJP plans to directly reach between 1 and 1.5 crore people across the state. A senior state leader described the initiative as a potential “game changer” for the party in the upcoming polls.

State BJP president Samik Bhattacharya termed the yatra “the next phase of democratic correction in Bengal.”

“After 34 years of Left rule, people voted for change. Fifteen years later, there is a demand for another change. The ‘Paribartan Yatra’ is about reconnecting with that sentiment,” he said.

Several senior central leaders, including BJP president J. P. Nadda and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, are expected to participate in different legs of the journey.

The BJP had won 18 Lok Sabha seats in the state in 2019, emerging as the principal challenger to Chief Minister and TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee. However, despite an aggressive campaign in the 2021 Assembly elections, the party failed to unseat the TMC government.