The Bengal BJP leadership is mulling a complete overhaul of its Purulia district committee following revolt among district leaders over the new committee that excluded representatives from the Balarampur Assembly segment.

The last district committee included Baneshwar Mahato, the present Balarampur MLA.

According to many BJP insiders, Balarampur has been instrumental in BJP’s rise in Bengal and not including anyone from it in the district committee sends ”a wrong political message”.

In 2018, two BJP workers, Trilochan Mahato and Dulal Kumar, were allegedly hanged to death from high-tension electric towers. Another BJP worker, Jagannath Tudu, was lynched ahead of the panchayat polls. All three were from three villages in Balarampur.

The BJP had gone to town alleging these were murders by Trinamul goons, which helped spreading the party's organisation network. Top BJP leaders, including then national party chief Amit Shah, visited Balarampur after these deaths.

The BJP won six of nine Assembly seats in Purulia in 2021, with most district leaders attributing this to anti-Trinamul sentiment in the wake of the three deaths in Balarampur.

“Has the party forgotten the contributions of Balarampur and the three martyrs? It is absolutely unacceptable that not a single leader from this Assembly area has been inducted in the 23-member new district committee,” a local BJP leader said.

Vivek Ranga, the BJP’s Purulia president, said: “Balarampur would not be deprived. There are many committees including the youth wing that are yet to be formed. Representation of Balarampur will be there.”

However, sources said state leaders have communicated to the dissidents that the entire committee will be reset. “The discontent is widespread. State leaders have told us that they will change the committee,” a Purulia district leader said.

Problems for the BJP leaders in western districts have increased as around 145 BJP workers in Bankura resigned from their posts on Sunday, objecting to the newly formed district committee.

Junior Union minister and Bongaon MP Shantanu Thakur while leaving for Delhi — to attend the Parliament’s budget session — on Sunday said that he would speak to the BJP national leadership on the issue of discontent over the new state committee and district committees.