Junior Union minister Shantanu Thakur has conveyed to the party’s state unit that he won’t be available to campaign in the civic polls.

His message made it made it clear the lack of truce between the young MP from Bongaon — sulking since the new state committee of the party left out his loyalists from the Matua community — and 6 Muralidhar Sen Lane, the Bengal BJP headquarters.

“The (BJP) state leadership requested Thakur to campaign for candidates in the Matua-dominated areas in North 24-Parganas and Nadia, but he conveyed his inability,” a source in the state BJP headquarters told this paper.

Sources close to Thakur said he voiced his discontent over the composition of the state committee and district committees and list of candidates for the civic polls when state leaders approached him.

As Thakur is also the head of the Matua Mahasangha, a socio, cultural and religious body of the Matuas, a group of lower-caste Hindu refugees, the state BJP leadership was keen on having him as the star campaigner where people of the community predominate, a source said.In at least 9 to 10 municipalities in Bongaon and Nadia the Matua community plays a key role in deciding poll outcomes, and several other municipal areas in these two districts and parts of north Bengal, where they comprise a chunk of voters.

Phone calls to Thakur by this paper went unanswered.

Asked, state BJP chief Sukanta Majumdar said: “He (Thakur) will be busier with Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand (Assembly polls).”

Thakur’s absence is an embarrassment for Majumdar and Amitabha Chakraborty, BJP general secretary (organisation), who apparently “played a role in keeping his loyalists out of the ommittees”.

“For the February 27 polls when 108 civic bodies go for polls, our only hope was Matua belt... Thakur’s absence will weaken us,” said a BJP source.

A source said Thakur sent a message to Delhi on the “core issue” of his constituency, the Citizenship Amendment Act. The delay in enforcing it has disgruntled Matuas.
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