The ruling BJP in Assam has decided to focus on five Assembly seats where Muslim voters hold sway in the run-up to the 2026 Assembly elections, suggesting a “shift” in the party’s policy towards minority voters.

Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma had revealed about the five “focus” seats on Sunday.

The “shift” is being attributed to the two back-to-back wins in Muslim-majority seats in six months — Karimganj Lok Sabha seats in June and the Samaguri assembly seat on November 23.

Sarma had said on Sunday, “ ... We won Karimganj, which was, in my assessment ... the best result and the critical result because in the context of Assam nobody can expect Assam BJP will win an MP seat where 65 per cent people are from a religious minority. Same thing, we have repeated in Samaguri. In the next Assembly elections, we are going to repeat it in at least five constituencies.”

Sarma added, “So, I have my pathway already defined — I know where to go and which constituency to go. But all over Assam we cannot go. The situation is not correct right now. But I have outlined that North Karimganj, South Karimganj, Laharighat, Rupahi and Samaguri will be our focus areas.”

BJP’s Diplu Ranjan Sarma had won Samaguri, a Congress bastion, by 24,501 votes against Tanzil Hussain whose father had won the seat five times since 2001 and is currently the Congress’ Dhubri Lok Sabha MP.

The BJP had won the Karimganj by 18,360 votes.

Four of the five focus seats were won by the Congress in 2021 Assembly polls like the Samaguri, which the BJP won in the November’s bypolls. Four of these seats are Muslim dominated while North Karimganj has decisive Muslim votes. All five seats were won by the Congress in 2021.

The focus on Muslim areas is to ensure that it can check the Congress’s growing influence over the Muslim voters due to a weakening AIUDF and also have “some cushion” if the majority Hindu voters do start looking for an alternative, a political observer said.

Contrast

Sunday’s tone and tenor of Sarma towards minority voters was in sharp contrast to his remarks after the Lok Sabha elections, targetting the state’s Muslim population, especially the Miyas (Bengali-speaking migrant Muslims).

In July, Sarma had said that the Muslim population in Assam has reached 40 per cent and that the state’s changing demography was a “big” issue for him. “We have lost many districts (where Muslims are a majority). This is not a political issue for me. It is a matter of life and death for me,” Sarma had said.

The same month, while alluding to the Muslim community, he had said that crimes committed by people of a particular religion since the Lok Sabha elections were a “matter of concern”.

In October 2023, Sarma had said he did not need the Miya votes for the next ten years.