Muted in town, charged at border: Malda Assembly polls shaped by legacy, SIR, migration
Telegraph | 23 April 2026
In Malda’s English Bazar, remove the party flags and this election is easy to miss.
On a sweltering afternoon, party offices sit half-empty, their shutters pulled halfway down. A few plastic chairs, a cluster of flags, and a poster curling at the edges — the markers of an election are present, but stripped of urgency.
Candidates, local residents say, are out campaigning from morning until late at night. Yet at tea stalls, conversations drift more towards the price of mangoes than manifestos.
“There’s interest,” a shopkeeper shrugged, “but not urgency.”
Travel roughly 30 kilometres towards the border, and the mood shifts.
In Kaliachak, Baishnabnagar and Mothabari, politics is not ambient; it is charged, personal and emotional. Much of that intensity, residents say, stems from the recent Special Intensive Revision (SIR), which saw a high number of deletions in Muslim-majority pockets.
“People are angry and confused,” said one local observer.
Here, elections feel immediate.
Between these two Maldas — one indifferent, the other agitated — lies a contest shaped less by waves and more by layered currents.
At its centre is a familiar name that refuses to fade: A.B.A. Ghani Khan Choudhury.
For decades, his legacy made Malda synonymous with the Congress. Roads, railway divisions, jobs — his imprint turned the party into an institution. That dominance eroded with the rise of the Trinamool, as local leaders and workers defected in waves.
This election, that old network appears to be stirring again.
Locals told The Telegraph Online that sections of Congress voters had shifted to both the BJP and the Trinamool, influenced in part by leaders such as Isha Khan Choudhury and Mausam Noor.
At campaign sites across Sujapur and adjoining belts, Congress workers were visibly present, often outnumbering rivals.
“They have more feet on the ground this time,” said a retired government employee who has spent his life in the district.
Much of this resurgence is being attributed to Isha Khan Choudhury and Mausam Noor, both seen as inheritors of the family’s political capital.
Mausam Noor has returned to the Congress after a seven-year stint with the Trinamool.
“Isha Khan speaks about Malda’s deprivation,” he said. “He raises issues like the lack of industry, migration and jobs. People listen.”
For many, it evokes memories of Ghani Khan Choudhury.
Deprivation here is not merely rhetorical. Malda remains among the poorer districts in West Bengal, marked by limited industrial development and a steady outflow of migrant labour.
For many families, remittances from Kerala, Gujarat or Delhi are as crucial as the district’s mango economy.
“There is no future here for educated youth,” another local resident said. “Either you leave, or you compromise.”
That frustration is visible across party lines, but it has not translated into a straightforward anti-incumbency wave against the Trinamool.
The party continues to draw strength from its welfare architecture. Schemes such as Lakshmir Bhandar have built a loyal base, particularly among women and lower-income households.
In several villages, beneficiaries described the scheme as a reliable monthly support — often the difference between subsistence and stability.
Yet beneath that support lies a more complicated organisational mood.
In conversations with Trinamool workers, a pattern emerged: hesitation.
When asked about the government’s performance, many deflected, urging others to speak. Some quietly excused themselves. “I can’t speak on camera,” one said. Others appeared reluctant to engage.
The result is a cadre base caught between confidence and fatigue.
Privately, some acknowledged the possibility of losses, though such views rarely surface on record.
If the Trinamool’s presence feels uneven, the BJP presents a different paradox: electoral growth, but limited visibility.
Across the district, BJP rallies were fewer and campaign offices often quieter. Its rise here, residents said, is being driven less by mobilisation and more by underlying shifts — discontent with the Trinamool, the collapse of the Left, and a gradual consolidation of anti-incumbent votes.
Yet the BJP’s campaign has been restrained.
Unlike in other parts of India, where issues such as illegal immigration dominate its messaging, local residents say the party has been cautious in foregrounding such themes.
“People here don’t respond well to that kind of rhetoric,” said a government employee who refused to be identified. “In fact, it can backfire.”
“You can’t tell someone who grew up with you that they are an outsider,” he said. “That creates resentment.”
Instead, what appears to be gaining traction is a quieter sentiment: frustration with governance, coupled with a search for alternatives.
The decline of the CPM has accelerated this shift. Once a significant force in Malda, the Left now plays a limited role. Its residual vote base is fragmenting — some drifting towards the BJP, others returning to the Congress.
Overlaying all of this is the impact of the SIR, in border constituencies such as Kaliachak and Mothabari.
Reports of large-scale deletions have triggered anxiety and anger among affected communities, adding an emotional charge to the campaign.
“This is not just a technical issue,” said a local author. “It has become personal.”
The political arithmetic, then, is anything but settled.
The Congress is attempting a comeback, drawing on legacy and local presence. The Trinamool retains a welfare-backed base but faces organisational strain. The BJP is expanding, but cautiously.
Malda goes to polls on Thursday in the first phase of Bengal Assembly elections. In the 2021 Assembly elections, the TMC won eight of the 12 seats in the districts, the BJP won four.