Assam Assembly Elections 2026 | Snubbed by BJP, ally UPPL quits NDA; announce candidates for polls

The first list figures UPPL president and Rajya Sabha member Pramod Boro, who has been named for Tamulpur constituency.

Guwahati: In what may reshap political landscape in Assam's Bodoland region, United People's Party Liberal (UPPL), an ally of the BJP-led government since 2021, quit NDA and decided to contest the Assembly elections on its own after the saffron party finalised seat sharing pact with its rival, Bodoland People's Front (BPF).

The party on Tuesday announced that its ties with NDA ended citing the saffron party's snub to its requests for seat sharing arrangements for 15 constituencies in the politically important Bodoland region. This came hours after the UPPL released a list of seven candidates that included its President and Rajya Sabha member-elect Pramod Boro to contest the Assembly polls.

UPPL general secretary, Raju Kumar Narzary on Monday night said that candidates for the remaining eight seats in Bodoland region and a few outside would soon be announced. While Boro will contest from Tamulpur, MLA Lawrence Islary, Narzary and former president of All Bodo Students' Union, Dipen Boro, are the other prominent faces in the first list.

The decision came hours after Dilip Saikia, president of BJP's Assam unit, said the party decided not to ally with UPPL for the Assembly polls citing strategic reasons. He said it is upto BPF and UPPL to share the seats. Out of the 15 seats under Bodoland Territorial Region, BJP and BPF decided to contest in four and 11 seats, respectively. UPPL sources told DH that it sought seven seats but BJP offered them only four.

The development is significant given the fact that a party from Bodoland region has remained a partner in the state government since formation of BPF and signing of Bodoland Peace Accord in 2003 and even before.

Interestingly, Pramod, who headed the Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC) between 2020 and 2025, was recently elected unopposed to Rajya Sabha with the support of BJP and other allies. The party has seven MLAs, one of whom, UG Brahma, is a minister in Himanta Biswa Sarma cabinet.

Narzary told reporters in Kokrajhar, the headquarters of BTC, that the party decided to contest in all 15 seats under BTR and a few outside after their repeated appeals to BJP to forge a "respectable" seat sharing pact remained unattended.

"We wanted a balance of power in BTR as the Bodoland People’s Front is currently in power of BTC. People could have approached UPPL MLAs if their issues were not addressed by the council. But BJP did not respond to our requests," he said.

Bodoland equation

With a target to form the government for the third straight term, BJP has renewed its alliance with Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) and re-inducted BPF into NDA after its victory in the BTC polls in September last year.

BJP had similarly pushed out BPF ahead of the Assembly elections in 2021, when it stitched a pre-poll alliance with UPPL.

Both BJP and UPPL was in power of BTC between 2020 and 2025 but lost the polls to BPF in September last year. Both BJP and UPPL had also contested the BTC polls separately. BJP decided to get BPF back on board after its landslide victory in BTC polls and its apparent surge in Bodoland politics, something which upset UPPL.

Several of UPPL leaders including Pramod Boro were part of efforts that led to signing of the new Bodoland Accord in 2020 that ended four-decades-long insurgency in Bodoland.

"Bodoland remained totally peacefull during our tenure in BTC till September 2025. But since BPF came back to power, the situation has again became tense and several violent incidents have taken place. BTR is again also witnessing illegal activities like gambling, cattle smuggling and corruption. We will try to highlight these issues and seek the mandate from the people during the Assembly elections," Narzary said.

Elections for 126 member Assembly is scheduled on April 9.