Bengal BJP chief Dilip Ghosh says party won’t take responsibility of Mukul Roy’s past “sins”, indicating a sharp divide within

Brother-in-law of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader from West Bengal, Mukul Roy, was arrested by the Bengal Police on Friday night from Delhi for allegedly duping young aspirants, promising them jobs in the Indian Railways.

Does this mean Mukul Roy may be arrested too, considering there are several complaints filed against him for duping people similarly? There were speculations and rumours on this throughout the day.

But if that really happens, how will the Bengal BJP react? Will they allege the Trinamool Congress used the state machinery to arrest their leader? Or, will their reaction be quite unexpected?

The answer may to this have been indicated in a comment made by West Bengal BJP chief Dilip Ghosh, who told The Bengal Story on Sunday that “the BJP will not take the responsibility of someone’s past sins”. He further added that “any such event will only tarnish the image of the Trinamool Congress, because the complaints are from the days when he was with that party. He was not with us then.”

Ghosh said that the BJP would take the responsibility only for someone who had done something wrong while working for the party, not for what they did earlier.

These comments are indications of the major rift that exists within the West Bengal unit of the BJP – where the top leaders Dilip Ghosh and Rahul Sinha were not keen on the induction of Mukul Roy into the party initially. It was the BJP’s central leadership’s keenness that enabled Roy’s entry. Mukul Roy was not available to comment on Ghosh’s observations.

It may be recalled that Roy had formally joined the BJP in New Delhi in November 2017 and was “welcomed” to the party – showcased at a press conference – by Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad and party general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya. Later, BJP President Amit Shah, who was not present at the press conference, posed for some photographs with Mukul Roy.

Roy has been questioned by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in connection with the Saradha chit fund scam and his name figured in the Narada tapes issue. Roy, a founding member of the Trinamool Congress, had a major fallout with the TMC leadership some years ago.

The BJP’s national leaders felt that the state unit would benefit from a leader like Mukul Roy, who knows many “secrets” of the Trinamool Congress and would be able to embarrass the TMC leadership from time to time. Also, Roy knows West Bengal constituencies like the back of his hand. He is hardworking, has good organisational skills, knows the voting patterns of every corner of the state, and how to influence it.

However, the state BJP unit was reluctant, reasoning that a “tainted” leader like Mukul Roy may not be good for the party that has witnessed a huge increase in voting percentage for the past few years in the state. There were also leadership issues – as the top bosses, Dilip Ghosh (who has an RSS background) and Rahul Sinha did not want an “outsider” among the top leadership. Ghosh can be seen in photographs with Mukul Roy, all smiles, but insiders say that don’t exactly share a great working relationship.

Now, with rumours over Mukul Roy’s future in connection with the complaints against him, it appears that the Bengal BJP may not be so worried nor make a hue and cry about it. Instead, they might be more keen on sending across a message to the BJP central leadership that they had shown their reluctance about his entry into the party in the first place.