From Suvendu Adhikari to Himanta Biswa Sarma: These leaders with a Congess past became BJP CMs

Suvendu Adhikari is now the Chief Minister of West Bengal, paving the way for a new age of politics in West Bengal after the BJP’s landslide and historic win in the state earlier this week. Adhikari is expected to turn a new leaf in the eastern state after 15 years of tumultuous but largely unbeatable rule of Trinamool Congress under Mamata Banerjee.

Adhikari was unanimously elected leader of the BJP legislature party, Union Home Minister Amit Shah announced on Friday after a meeting of newly elected BJP MLAs and senior leaders, formally sealing the BJP’s emphatic capture of power in Bengal in the assembly polls.

A quick look at Adhikari’s political resume will reveal that he is a seasoned leader with experience working within all major political parties in Bengal, from Congress to the BJP. He is the same man who once worked under Mamata and is now replacing her as the chief minister.

The son of former Union minister Sisir Adhikari, the 55-year-old leader began his political career in the Congress’s student wing Chhatra Parishad during the peak of Left dominance in Bengal politics.

As West Bengal’s first BJP minister,
Adhikari’s meteoric rise from being Mamata’s trusted aide to the BJP’s headliner in the state is noteworthy. The leader first came to the fore after he led the 2007 Nandigram land acquisition protests in West Bengal against the then-CPI government.

Over time, he emerged as one of the TMC’s strongest organisers in southern Bengal and the Jangal Mahal region. He was elected to the Lok Sabha from Tamluk in 2009 and later joined the state cabinet as Transport Minister following the 2016 Assembly elections. His rising organisational influence played a key role in helping the party expand its support base across several rural parts of the state.

But his efforts did not get him a permanent ticket in TMC, as he resigned from the party in all capacities in 2020, owing to differences with its central leadership. Soon after this,
Adhikari joined the BJP and was instrumental in moving the party from the fringes to the forefront in West Bengal.

Here’s a look at other leaders who switched from Congress to the BJP, eventually rising in the ranks to become chief ministers:

Himanta Biswa Sarma

Once a Congress strongman and the party’s lead strategist in the northeast, Assam Chief Minister
Himanta Biswa Sarma quit the grand old party in 2015. Sarma’s exit from the party doomed Congress, which was completely wiped out from the region in the next few years.

Ghulam Nabi Azad, a former Congress leader himself, revealed in his book that Rahul Gandhi was indifferent to Sarma’s exit and merely said “let him go” when the chief minister announced his resignation.

“Rahul told us bluntly that there would be no change in leadership. We pointed out to him (Rahul) that Himanta had the majority of MLAs and would rebel and quit the party. ‘Let him go,’ Rahul said. The meeting was over,” Azad said in his autobiography.

Pema Khandu

Pema Khandu, the current chief minister of Andhra Pradesh, once held that post from Congress’s ticket. Now, a prominent leader of the BJP, Khandu, quit Congress as the sitting chief minister in 2016 to join a BJP ally, the People’s Party of Arunachal.

He had won from his father’s constituency in Mukto and was appointed as Congress’s chief minister, a post he kept for barely two months before leaving for the BJP along with 43 MLAs.

He later became Arunachal Pradesh’s chief minister again after the BJP’s numbers stacked up in its favour in the assembly.

N. Biren Singh

In 2015, the former chief minister of Manipur, N. Biren Singh, quit the Congress party and joined the BJP after a revolt with the then-chief minister, Okram Ibobi Singh.

After joining the BJP, Singh was made the chief minister of Manipur in 2017.

Gegong Apang

The former chief minister of Arunachal Pradesh, Gegong Apang, was a Congress leader before he quit the party in 2003. Joining the BJP gave Apang the chance to lead the state as the chief minister for the second time after completing a full term in the post as a Congress member.

He later quit the BJP in 2019 to join the Janata Dal (United).