A week-long meeting of the BJP held in Delhi to take stock of the party’s position in Bengal bared the fissures in the state unit as some functionaries blamed state president Dilip Ghosh and an alleged clique for not allowing them to function properly.

Multiple party insiders told this correspondent that Arjun Singh, a Trinamul turncoat and the Barrackpore BJP MP, was open in his criticism of Ghosh and Subrata Chatterjee, general secretary (organisation) on Monday, the last day of the week-long affair.

“Arjun did not mince his words. He clearly told the national leadership present at the meeting that Dilip da and Subrata da don’t believe in inclusivity,” a source said.

He added that Singh was vocal about how Ghosh and his associates were not allowing the newcomers, especially those who had switched over from Trinamul, to function properly.

“Singh referred to harassment of him by police and Trinamul goons at his own locality and complained that the state BJP leadership didn’t take up the issue seriously,” the source added.

Contacted, Singh denied that he had spoken anything against Ghosh and Chatterjee. “This is absolutely wrong. We had no discussion on the party’s organisation. We only discussed the Assembly polls,” the Barrackpore MP said.

When the series of meetings had started last Wednesday, another Trinamul turncoat Mukul Roy had also expressed his discontent with an Assembly seat-wise forecast that Ghosh and Shivprakash (national joint general secretary, organisation) had presented before national leaders like Kailash Vijayvargiya and Arvind Menon.

Sources said the report claimed that the BJP was capable of winning over 190 seats in the Assembly polls. Roy had apparently doubted the numbers and said there was no place for complacence at this stage. “As his reservations were swatted away by Dilip-da, Subrata da and Shivprakash ji, he cut short his stay and returned to Calcutta citing medical reasons,” said a source.

Roy, however, denied the report on his disagreement with senior state BJP functionaries.

Multiple sources said discontent was brewing in the state BJP as some leaders thought Ghosh and his clique were running the organisation as their fiefdom, which was causing heartburn among a lot of functionaries, both old-timers and new inductees.

Recently, MP Saumitra Khan, who was named the president of the party’s youth wing, also expressed his unhappiness with the state of affairs as he was not allowed to choose the new committee.

“Most of those who went to Delhi were chosen by Dilip da and Subrata da.... Had the national leaders met other state leaders, who didn’t go to Delhi, they would have come to know more about what’s happening in Bengal,” said a source.