The Gorkha National Liberation Front (GNLF), an ally of the BJP, wants the saffron party to give it all the three hill seats in the Bengal Assembly polls in an effort to strengthen “regionalism” which they fear might be invaded otherwise.

Mamata Banerjee’s decision to leave the hill seats to her “friends” — the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha factions — seems to have provided traction to the GNLF.

A senior GNLF leader involved in the negotiations with BJP told The Telegraph that the party has demanded the hill seats of Darjeeling, Kalimpong and Kurseong. However, sources said that the BJP is keen to repeat its 2019 experiment of giving a BJP ticket to a leader from a hill party in at least one seat.

“We want all three hill seats as we are the (BJP’s) strongest ally in the hills. We supported the BJP in the Lok Sabha polls and it is only fair that the BJP is accommodating (to the GNLF) this time,” the leader said.

Many in the GNLF believe that it is foolhardy for national parties to think that they would become vanguards of the hill people. “Our demands and issues can only be taken up by regional parties. Efforts to weaken regionalism is neither smart nor will it succeed,” the leader said.

After GNLF came to power in the hills in 1988 no national or plain centric party has been able to hold sway over the hills.

The leader drew parallels with Trinamul’s hill graph. “They tried their best to expand their party and field their own candidates but they were never successful. Even when we were with Trinamul we had specifically pointed out the importance of regional parties to their leadership,” a GNLF leader said.

Trinamul has never won Darjeeling Lok Sabha or Assembly seats.

During the Darjeeling Assembly bypoll in 2019, the BJP offered its ticket and thus the symbol to GNLF Leader Neeraj Zimba, who defeated Gorkha Janmukti Morcha’s Binay Tamang.

This time many in GNLF are not comfortable with such an arrangement.

“A section in the party wants to fight the election with our symbol, with support from the BJP,” a party source said.

Ajoy Edwards, GNLF Darjeeling branch committee president, however, said that for the party the most important factor was to solve the hill issues. “Who gets the ticket from where is a secondary issue for the party. The primary issue is to solve hill issues,” said Edwards. The BJP in its 2019 election manifesto had promised tribal status to 11 hill communities and “permanent political solution.”

Kalyan Dewan, president, BJP (hills) also said that longterm coalition interest should be of importance. “I cannot comment on what the GNLF thinks but elections come and go. We need to keep in mind the interest of coalition for the longterm benefit of the hill people,” said Dewan.