In the next nine months, three key assembly elections are coming up in eastern India. While Bihar will go to polls in the latter half of 2025, elections for Assam and West Bengal assemblies will follow in the early part of 2026. At stake are 663 seats, of which the BJP or the BJP-led NDA has 131 in Bihar (out of 243), 84 in Assam (out of 126) and 65 (out of 294) in West Bengal. In Assam the two warring sides—the BJP and the Congress—are busy chalking up their strategies and marshalling forces.

For starters, both have brought in new generals in the form of state unit presidents. Two-time MP and old RSS hand Dilip Saikia heads the BJP state unit, while the Congress has chosen its young MP Gaurav Gogoi.

With a fresh face, a clean image and an impressive performance as deputy leader of the party in the Lok Sabha, Gogoi has enthused party workers. What he needs to prove is his ability to run the organisation and deal with the twists and turns of politics.

It will be an acid test for Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma too. Put in charge of the party’s campaign in Jharkhand, he failed to deliver. His record as BJP’s pointsman in the NE has also taken a hit following the developments in Manipur and the rumblings elsewhere. Even if the BJP wins the election, he may well be thrown under the bus. On paper, the BJP has the party-inpower advantage, buoyed by access to vast resources and high-octane leadership under Sarma.

Since Sarma’s switch from the Congress to the BJP in 2016, his electoral graph, in terms of number of seats and vote share, has been on the rise. Riding the visible presence of around 40 per cent Muslims in Assam, he unleashed a strident campaign based on religious polarisation that has, so far, worked for the BJP.

It helped that Sarma was familiar with the inner dynamics of the Congress and was able to plant his Trojan horses accordingly, resulting in a factional feud in the Congress’s state unit. Gogoi’s entry will no doubt upset many of the entrenched, while also forcing the BJP to recalibrate its plan. Sarma lost no time in attacking Gogoi, accusing him and his wife of a Pakistani nexus. “Sarma is clearly nervous.

Gaurav has a clean image and unlike many of us, he has no incumbency baggage,” said veteran Congress MP Pradyut Bordoloi. In terms of numbers, however, the BJP appears to be on firm ground. The panchayat election earlier this year signalled its strong grassroots hold. The NDA alliance won 300 out of 376 zilla parishad seats with more than 76 per cent of the vote share.

In the Anchalik panchayat elections, it won 1,436 out of 2,192 seats, with 66 per cent votes. This has given the BJP the confidence to announce that it aims to win no fewer than 100 seats in the next elections. Given the scenario, the GoP and Gaurav Gogoi face a formidable challenge. The initial response to Gogoi’s entry has been positive.

Huge crowds gathered to welcome his arrival at Jorhat, his constituency, and thousands of supporters accompanied him on his 250-km long road trip from Sivasagar to Nagaon. On 1 June 2025, Gogoi visited the historic Siva Doul (temple) in Sivasagar town. Later, speaking to the media, he said, “Greed for money and land is driving the BJP policy in Guwahati.

The CM was the Guwahati development minister for a long time. Now, his close associate is the minister. But BJP ministers care more about the road to their own house than preserving water bodies and building drainage systems.”

While Gogoi’s call for unity and his tirade against Sarma were expected, his visit to the Siva Doul may signal a shift in the Congress’s evolving strategy, especially in light of allegations that the party has been indifferent to reports of encroachment of namghars and satras, which are integral to rural Assam’s socio-cultural landscape.

While corruption and development issues may feature high on the list of the Congress’s talking points, more than one party leader said the party has to develop an “effective counter-narrative” to combat Sarma’s tactical polarisation of the electorate. “It is a myth that the Muslims of Assam vote for the Congress en bloc (as Sarma has assiduously propagated),” said Congress leader Hafiz Rashid Choudhury.

Formerly an AIUDF leader, Choudhury suggested that the declining influence of the AIUDF in Lower Assam and the Barak Valley, and of the AGP in Upper Assam, could work in the Congress’s favour. “Gogoi won the MP election from Jorhat even after delimitation of his constituency,” he said.

In fact, with the AGP almost wiped out, the Congress increased its vote share by 10.5 per cent. But anti-incumbency, restive allies and allegations of corruption are not the only bugbears for Himanta’s BJP. “Former chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal’s re-entry into state politics is another issue Sarma will have to address,” said a prominent Assamese journalist, pointing out that Sonowal was already engaging with the BJP’s booth-level workers.

The BJP’s performance will also depend on how Sarma works out the ticket distribution. The Congress will have to close ranks and work on a simple but credible narrative. A united and vigorous campaign, a message of hope and a concrete plan for a better Assam will do the trick, say Congress workers. The party, they believe, also needs to stitch strategic alliances and cultivate the various ethnic and tribal groups whose politics today is more transactional than ideological. As things stand, it may not be a cakewalk for the BJP in Assam.

While the BJP and its allies are firmly entrenched in the zilla parishad and gram panchayats, the numbers only tell a partial story. In Assam, approximately 49 per cent of the population resides in areas governed by autonomous tribal district councils formed under the Constitution’s Sixth Schedule. This translates to roughly 17 lakh people. No panchayat elections are held in these areas; but they do participate in assembly elections.

Take, for instance, the Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR), administered by the Bodoland Territorial Council. BTR used to send 11 MLAs to the state assembly. After delimitation, this number has gone up to 15. The council is now administered by the United People’s Party Liberal (UPPL) which is a regional party headed by Pramod Boro. UPPL has an alliance with the BJP outside BTC; within BTC, they are competitors.

There are reports that Boro may be upset with the BJP because it has reached out to Bodoland People’s Front (BPF) chief Hagrama Mohilary, whom Boro had defeated in the 2020 BTR elections after the Third Bodo Accord. Trouble is also brewing on another front over a proposed thermal plant in Kokrajhar, the BTR administrative headquarters.

The BTC has handed over 3,600 bighas to the Adani group. “The land transfer is illegal as it is tribal and reserve forest land,” said Anjali Daimari, who is leading an anti-eviction movement under the banner of her newly-formed Alternative Party of Bodoland (APB) ahead of the BTC elections in September.

With a number of other autonomous councils ruled by various regional and local parties, it remains to be seen how the BJP and the Congress balance their competing interests and woo these crucial communities.