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Kolkata, Nov 3 (IANS) Mainly Jharkhand-based party Jharkhand Loktantrik Krantikari Morcha (JLKM) has announced its decision to contest the 2026 West Bengal Assembly elections, which will exclusively focus on the erstwhile Maoist-dominated Jangalmahal tribal region.
JLKM founder and party MLA from Dumri assembly constituency in Jharkhand’s Bokaro district Jairam Kumar Mahato addressed the party’s inaugural political convention in West Bengal on Sunday evening. He directed the party workers to start the ground work to contest the seats in the 2026 elections.
Mahato later told the media that the party would focus on tribal-dominated constituencies in the Jangalmahal region, which includes four districts, Bankura, Purulia, West Midnapore and Jhargram.
Mahato confirmed, “The exact number of seats our party will contest in the 2026 elections will be decided only after the detailed survey in this belt is completed. The survey is already underway.”
He launched a scathing criticism against the state government and the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) for neglecting the tribal areas in Jangalmahal for a long time.
Mahato said, “Our movement is not just political. It is also social in nature. Our movement is to establish the rights of the tribal community people over land, forest and water in their own soil.”
Since 1977, the Communist Party of India-Marxist-led Left Front has maintained an almost undisputed electoral hold on the tribal-dominated Jangalmahal region. Around 2000, the Maoists gradually gained influence in the area by winning the trust of tribal communities and taking advantage of their grievances against the then Left Front government.
Since 2011, the Trinamool Congress has established a strong electoral hold on the region. This dominance was challenged for the first time in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, when Bharatiya Janata Party candidates won all parliamentary seats in the region.
BJP maintained its lead in the 2021 West Bengal Assembly elections also. However, in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, TMC secured significant support in tribal dominated areas of Jangalmahal except Purulia.
–IANS
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