India's Bharatiya Janata Party won control of West Bengal for the first time in May 2026, securing 200 of 294 legislative seats and defeating the All India Trinamool Congress led by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who had governed since 2011. The election saw record 92.93 percent turnout among 68.2 million voters, but was marked by controversy over the Election Commission's removal of nine million people from electoral rolls—nearly 12 percent of registered voters—through a Special Intensive Revision that Banerjee challenged unsuccessfully in the Supreme Court. The Modi government deployed a record 2,400 companies of paramilitary troops for the election, while BJP leaders claimed Hindu voter consolidation drove their victory in a state where over a quarter of the population is Muslim. The breakthrough represents a major political shift in West Bengal, which had been ruled by communist parties from 1977 to 2011 before Banerjee's Trinamool Congress took power emphasizing religious pluralism and minority rights protection.
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