GUWAHATI: In a major political development in West Bengal, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate Suvendu Adhikari has defeated Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in a closely watched contest, marking one of the most significant electoral outcomes in the state in recent years.
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Adhikari secured 73,917 votes, ahead of Mamata Banerjee of the All India Trinamool Congress (AITC), who polled 58,812 votes. The margin of victory stood at 15,105 votes.
Suvendu Adhikari is the BJP’s CM candidate for West Bengal.
Mamata Banerjee, who has served as West Bengal’s Chief Minister since 2011, remains one of the most influential political figures in the state. She began her political journey in the 1970s through the student wing of the Congress party and went on to become one of India’s youngest MPs in 1984 after defeating CPI(M) leader Somnath Chatterjee from Jadavpur.
She later held key Union ministerial portfolios, including Youth Affairs, Sports, Women and Child Development, and served twice as Railway Minister before breaking away from Congress in 1998 to form the Trinamool Congress.
Suvendu Adhikari, once a close aide of Mamata Banerjee, played a prominent role during the 2007–08 Nandigram agitation against the then Left Front government. The movement later became a defining moment in Bengal politics, contributing to the political momentum that helped Banerjee’s party come to power in 2011, ending over three decades of Communist rule in the state.
Adhikari parted ways with the Trinamool Congress in 2020, joining the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) amid growing internal differences and concerns about being politically marginalised within the organisation, particularly as the influence of Mamata Banerjee’s nephew, Abhishek Banerjee, expanded within the party structure.
Their political rivalry intensified during the 2021 Assembly elections when Banerjee directly contested against Adhikari in Nandigram, his stronghold. In a closely fought contest, she lost by a narrow margin of 1,956 votes, although the Trinamool Congress went on to secure a broader victory across the state.
The latest result further deepens this long-standing political rivalry, marking a significant reversal in a contest shaped by shifting loyalties, regional influence, and years of electoral confrontation between the two leaders.
The result is being seen as a dramatic political shift in West Bengal, with early reactions pointing to a major realignment in voter preference. High voter turnout, reported at 92.47%, underlined the intensity of the contest.
According to emerging political narratives, the outcome signals a sharp departure from the long-standing dominance of the Trinamool Congress in the state, with the BJP gaining significant ground in a historic breakthrough.