The state BJP leadership will organise several activities in north Bengal over the next few months, starting from Monday led by Bengal party president Sukanta Majumdar as “damage control” after several of its elected representatives publicly supported the demand for a separate Cooch Behar state.

North Bengal, with eight MP seats and 54 MLA seats, saw the BJP seven and 30 MLA seats, respectively in the most recent general and Assembly elections.

Now that the party is drawing up plans for the 2023 panchayat polls, some BJP leaders feel that some MPs and MLAs from north Bengal have caused damage to its poll prospects by openly backing the statehood demand by outfits that thrive on identity politics.

A number of organisations with clout among Rajbanshis have been flagging the demand for a separate state of Cooch Behar for years. There is also a steady demand for Gorkhaland in the hills.

For the past 13 years, the BJP has taken up the strategy to stoke sentiments of people regarding these statehood demands to win polls.

“While our party is principally in favour of smaller administrative units, our central leaders haven't endorsed the demands for a separate Cooch Behar state.… There is a realisation that backing these (separate state) demands is causing irreparable damage to the party in some areas of north and south Bengal as there is also a strong sentiment among many people in the state against such demands,” said a senior state BJP leader.

“If we want to put up a decent fight in the panchayat polls, we will have to change the perception that has been created by the open endorsement of a separate north Bengal state,” he added.

In the past 18 months, many BJP legislators have openly backed the demand.

Last week, while attending an event of a faction of Greater Cooch Behar Peoples’ Association, some BJP MLAs of the district and MP Nisith Pramanik, who is also a Union minister of state, ended up supporting the demand.

In May this year, the demand was raised by some MLAs at a public meeting of Union home minister Amit Shah in Siliguri.

“These comments didn’t go down well with the central leaders as J.P. Nadda (national party president of the BJP) said in June this year that no state leaders and legislators should speak on statehood. In the recently held training session in Calcutta, the issue came up for discussion and it was decided that we cannot be seen supporting separatist demands,” said a BJP leader who attended the event.

As a result, as a part of the new plan, office bearers of the party in north Bengal districts and representatives of frontal organisations have been asked to intensify political activities against the state government on issues of corruption and nepotism.

The state BJP leaders and workers have been instructed to tell people elaborately about the “malpractices reported in the panchayats" and “highhandedness of syndicates”, instead.

“In a regular manner, our state leaders will visit the districts and attend public events such as protest marches and public meetings,” said a party insider.

The district leaders of the BJP have also been asked to pass a clear missive that people working in different tiers of the party should not make any controversial statement on the statehood of Cooch Behar.

“Our state and central leaders have clarified the party’s stand on separate statehood that we are against any division of Bengal. This is our stand and all of us should adhere to it,” said Sukumar Roy, the Cooch Behar district BJP president.