The BJP’s first solo victory in West Bengal was not the smooth progression of one win after another, but it has been decades in the making. From tapping Mamata Banerjee’s newly launched party Trinamool Congress as an NDA ally at the Centre during the Vajpayee era to being the only party with the firepower to halt Ms. Banerjee’s bid for a fourth term in the State, it has been a long slog.

The peaks of the BJP’s tally of 18 seats in the 2019 Lok Sabha election were followed by the troughs of a loss in the 2021 Assembly polls and a depleted tally of parliamentary seats in 2024. Therefore, for the 2026 Assembly polls, the organisational planning and messaging had to sit just right.