'Pan-Indian strategy won't work in Bengal': BJP leader after by-poll debacle

A day after the BJP scored a duck in the by-polls, its Bengal vice president Chandra Kumar Bose on Friday said it was time for the party to devise a state-specific plan as "a pan-Indian strategy would not apply to the land of Vivekananda and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose". Calling for introspection, Bose, the grandnephew of Netaji, said the party should not have made the issue of NRC its primary poll plank during the by-polls.

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'Have to rectify our organisational lacunae'

"It is essential for the BJP in the state to cleanse the organisation and devise a Bengal-specific strategy. We have to rectify our organisational lacunae. A pan-Indian strategy will not apply to the land of Swami Vivekananda and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose," he told reporters. Political parties must work to develop the basic infrastructure in the state and not just try to polarize people to secure vote banks, the senior BJP leader said.

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"People of Bengal are politically sharp and astute. Our party should not have made NRC it's key poll plank as there is a lot of confusion surrounding the matter. We could have highlighted other issues," he added. The ruling Trinamool Congress in West Bengal on Thursday bagged all three assembly seats where by-polls were held earlier this week, trouncing challenger BJP, a victory that Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee dubbed as a "mandate against NRC" and in favour of "secularism and unity".

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