Assam polls: BJP keeps tribal council-based ally in limbo

GUWAHATI

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has kept one of its three tribal council-based allies in poll-bound Assam guessing about its status in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

The BJP ditched the Bodoland People’s Front (BPF), its pre-2016 poll ally, to befriend the United People’s Party Liberal (UPPL) ahead of the 2021 Assembly elections. The BJP “remarried” the BPF months ahead of Mandate 2026, without “divorcing” the UPPL.

The BPF and UPPL are bitter rivals in the Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC), which governs the Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR) comprising 15 Assembly seats, which often prove crucial whenever the verdict in Assam is fractured.

In 2020, the UPPL ended the BPF’s 17-year reign in the BTR with the BJP as its ally. The alliance progressed to the State Assembly in 2021, but the BJP lost no time in welcoming the BPF back into the NDA after it trounced the UPPL in the September 2025 BTC polls.

On March 10, UPPL general secretary Raju Kumar Narzary wrote to State BJP president Dilip Saikia, seeking to know his party’s status in the NDA for the ensuing Assembly election by March 12.

“We have not received a reply yet,” UPPL president Pramod Boro told The Hindu.

The letter was shot off a day after Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma told journalists that the BPF would contest 11 seats and the BJP would contest the remaining four seats across the BTR.

“The BPF was given a larger share of the seats, as it is the largest party in the BTR. If the UPPL decides to go for an alliance, it has to be with the BPF and not the BJP. With only four seats, we have no scope for a seat-sharing understanding with the UPPL,” he said.

Mr Boro, who was elected to the Rajya Sabha uncontested a few hours later, said that he was the official declared candidate of the UPPL and not of others. He also said that his party would contest all 15 seats across the BTR, indicating a payback, as the BJP did not form an alliance during the 2025 election to the 40-seat BTC.

Neither the BJP nor Congress has a solid base in the BTR, which covers five districts—Baksa, Chirang, Kokrajhar, Tamulpur, and Udalguri.

The third tribal council-based ally of the BJP is the Rabha Hasong Joutha Mancha, which wields clout in a couple of constituencies straddling the Rabha Hasong Autonomous Council in south-western Assam.

The Asom Gana Parishad is the BJP’s ally in constituencies beyond the tribal council areas. The BJP and its allies are expected to release their list of candidates after the BJP’s central leadership approves the seat-sharing formula.