Assam Elections 2026: Bhupen Borah, 55, a former president of the Congress party in Assam, will join the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) on 22 February, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said on Tuesday after meeting him. This comes as a major jolt to the opposition Congress in Assam ahead of the assembly polls, where it was once a dominant party.
Sarma visited Borah’s residence in the Ghoramara area of ​​Guwahati, a day after the senior leader resigned from the Congress. The CM was welcomed by Borah’s wife and son with ‘aarti’.
After the over one-and-a-half-hour-long meeting, Sarma announced that Borah will join the BJP along with his supporters, and that state BJP president Dilip Saikia will finalize the modalities.
“Borah, along with some of his supporters, will join the BJP in Guwahati, but there will be another joining program at Lakhimpur from where he hails, as many Congress members have expressed their desire to follow his steps,” Sarma said, with the veteran leader by his side.
Assam is going to the assembly polls later this year.
The chief minister claimed that Borah’s joining the BJP would show that Congress is not a place for Hindus. “He is the last recognized Hindu leader of the Congress here without family antecedents in the party,” he said.
Congress president from 2021 to 2025
He claimed Bora, who was the state Congress president from 2021 to 2025, has long struggled in the opposition party and will get a platform in the BJP to do what he wants.
Sarma, who also switched from the Congress to the BJP in 2015, said he had not met Borah for a long time.
“We did not talk much about politics but caught up on old times,” he added.
Sarma has been Assam CM since 2021. Before him, Sarbananda Sonwal, now a Union Minister, was the CM from 2016 to 2021. Tarun Gogoi, the veteran Congress leader, was the CM of Assam for 15 years from 20111 until 2016.
Asked about the seat from which Borah will contest the assembly polls, Sarma said, “He is not joining the BJP in exchange for an assembly seat. There is no bargaining involved… If required, he can even contest from Jalukbari (the CM’s constituency).”
The CM claimed that Congress should have addressed the issues that forced Borah to leave the party after 32 years and taken corrective measures.
“The Congress addresses issues with appeasement. It was only after he had tendered his resignation that party leadership rushed to his residence,” he said.
‘Grassroots leader’
Sarma said Borah’s joining will help the BJP, as he is a “grassroots leader,” and his resignation will create a significant “psychological impact” on Congress workers, with many likely to follow him.
He claimed that there are also many grassroots Muslim leaders in the Congress who are disillusioned and will join the Raijor Dal led by Akhil Gogoi in the future.
“The BJP will have Raijor Dal and not the Congress as its opposition in the 2031 assembly polls,” he claimed.
Borah’s joining will help the BJP, as he is a ‘grassroots leader.’
Borah, however, did not speak on the occasion. He served two terms as a member of the Assam Legislative Assembly representing Bihpuria from 2006 to 2016.
Borah had resigned from the Congress on Monday, but the party’s top leadership did not accept his resignation and attempted to persuade him to withdraw it. Following this, he sought time to reconsider his decision, during which Sarma met him and made the announcement.
