BJP national secretary Rahul Sinha said that Assembly elections in West Bengal might be held within a year, a day after two MLAs and around 50 Councillors of the Trinamool Congress (TMC) joined the saffron party in New Delhi.

Sinha, who lost the Lok Sabha elections 2019 to TMC’s Sudip Bandopadhyay, also said that the Bengal government is being run under pressure of police and CID.

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“I think Vidhan Sabha elections will be held within 6 months to 1 year in West Bengal. The current govt will not be able to continue till 2021. There is lot of dissatisfaction in TMC. The TMC govt is being run by police and CID pressure,” Sinha was quoted as saying by ANI.

After the induction of TMC leaders at the party headquarters in Delhi, BJP national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya said that “such joinings will continue in future also”. Besides

Among the TMC MLAs was Subhrangshu Roy, the son of BJP leader Mukul Roy. Besides the two TMC MLAs, a CPM MLA, too, joined the BJP.

“Like the elections were held in seven phases in West Bengal, the joinings in BJP will also happen in seven phases. Today was just the first phase,” ANI quoted Vijayvargiya as saying.

Arjun Singh, BJP’s newly-elected MP from Barrackpore, who left the TMC after being denied ticket from the Barrackpore constituency, has seemingly played a key role in engineering the defections.

Interestingly, Narendra Modi, in an election rally in Serampore, had claimed that 40 MLAs of Mamata Banerjee’s party were in touch with him and many of them would leave the Trinamool Congress after May 23, when Lok Sabha election results were announced.

Two days before the announcement of Lok Sabha results, BJP Bengal chief Dilip Ghosh had told thestatesman.com that his party was sure of forming the next government in the state, where Assembly elections are due in 2021. He also said that the TMC government led by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee might not last the next two years.

“They are only continuing for their selfish interests. They are afraid of the police and cases. Once the (Lok Sabha) results are out, Mamata government will become weak and they will leave,” Ghosh had said.

Read More | Not just Left, but Trinamool and Congress cadres too voted for us: Bengal BJP chief Dilip Ghosh

Banerjee is scheduled to arrive in Delhi today for Thursday’s swearing-in ceremony of Prime Minister-designate Narendra Modi.