The West Bengal unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party was reconstituted on 2 June, and one of the most talked about changes was that of Chandra Kumar Bose, Netaji Subhash Chandra Boses's grand-nephew, being dropped from the executive council.
Bose formerly held the post of vice-president in the party. The new party structure still has Dilip Ghosh as state BJP president with twelve vice-presidents, including former Trinamool Congress MLA and present BJP MP, Arjun Singh.
Speaking to The Quint, Bose said that he only came to know of the party's decision after it was made public. No one spoke to him before, he said.
'Didn't Oppose CAA, But Asked For Clarifications'
Taking a departure from the party line, Bose had raised questions of the controversial Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) when it was passed in Parliament in 2019.
When asked if that could be the reason for his omission from the executive council, Bose says that he didn't oppose the CAA, but just asked for clarifications and modifications.
“I didn’t oppose the CAA, but asked for clarifications and modifications. Amit Shah mentioned that it was not based on any religion. My question is, then why do we separately say Hindu, Sikh, Buddha, Jain etc. They should’ve just said ‘persecuted people’. The moment you don’t mention a particular community, you are segregating that community,” he said.
"In the demonstrations across the country, it was not just Muslims who were demonstrating, there were students and the youth. Not just JNU and Jadavpur, IITs and IIMs and colleges which had no political affiliations", he added, saying governments must not cause unrest or inconvenience people.
While maintaining that no communication was made from the party before the posts were announced, Bose said that he did speak to the party's minder in West Bengal, Kailash Vijayvargiya, who said that they will "engage him in a different capacity."
'Joined BJP on Development Plank, Not Hindu-Muslim'
"I joined BJP on a development plank," says Bose, “Not Hindu-Muslim, or religion."
"I saw Modi as a messiah to give a major thrust to the economy. I don't accept many things about the BJP and RSS, but Modi I saw differently. I thought he was a genuine admirer of Subhash Chandra Bose. No leader has reacted so positively to the Bose family. But BJP must follow Bose's inclusive policy to save the nation from complete destruction", he said.
“Maybe that’s where I’ve failed. I couldn’t convince my party and my colleagues. Modi, I feel, I convinced, but then you can’t talk to Modi on a daily basis!”, he added.
Bose also said that he considered his previous position as vice-president of the state BJP to be "ornamental".
“You don’t have financial power, or administrative power or manpower. How are you going to work?” he asks.
Since he joined the BJP, in 2016, Bose has contested two unsuccessful elections – the first being the West Bengal Legislative Assembly elections of 2016, when he stood against Mamata Banerjee in the Bhawanipur constituency. His second electoral loss came in the Lok Sabha Elections of 2019, where he lost to the TMC in the south Kolkata constituency.
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