Day after Shah's pep talk, Dilip Ghosh meets state BJP president Samik Bhattacharya

Kolkata, Jan 1 (PTI) Former West Bengal BJP president Dilip Ghosh on Thursday met incumbent Samik Bhattacharya at the party office here, a day after he was present at Union Home Minister Amit Shah's interaction with saffron party MPs, MLAs and organisational leaders.

Ghosh, who lost in the Lok Sabha elections in 2024 after having been shifted to Bardhaman-Durgapur from his winning constituency Medinipur, has largely stayed away from the forefront of the BJP's activities in the state over the past several months.

He met current BJP state president Samik Bhattacharya at the party's Salt Lake office here amid speculations of Ghosh playing an important role in the saffron brigade's attempt to win West Bengal in the upcoming assembly elections.

Shah on Wednesday chaired an organisational meeting of the BJP at a Salt Lake hotel here with MPs, MLAs, former MPs and former MLAs of the party.

In a post on X, Ghosh said, "#2026BengalElection is extremely important for Bharat." "In the last election, the struggle we fought established us in the eyes of the people of Bengal as the principal opposition. Today, people of Bengal are ready for change," he wrote.

Under Ghosh's stewardship, the tally of the BJP West Bengal unit rose from just two seats in 2014 to 18 in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections out of 42 constituencies in the state.

The BJP also went up from just three seats in 2016 to 77 in the 2021 assembly polls when Ghosh was the state party chief. PTI AMR RG