New Delhi: Tennis legend Leander Paes formally joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Tuesday, March 31, in the presence of Union Ministers Kiren Rijiju and Sukanta Majumdar, a move seen as a significant political signal ahead of the West Bengal assembly elections.
Paes, who had previously aligned with the Trinamool Congress in 2021 and campaigned for it during the Goa assembly elections the following year, described his induction as a “responsibility to serve the nation.”
“I played for the country for 40 years, now it’s time to serve the youth. This party membership slip is not just a slip but a responsibility to serve the nation,” he said after joining the party.
The move had been widely anticipated following his recent meeting with BJP president Nitin Nabin in Kolkata.
Thanking Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Paes said he saw the BJP platform as an opportunity to focus on sports education and youth empowerment. “Today, India is the youngest nation in the world. We should focus on sports education in the next 20-25 years,” he said, adding that his long-term vision included equal opportunity scholarships for women in sports.
Welcoming him into the party fold, Rijiju called Paes’s entry “historic” and said it would give further momentum to the Khelo India movement. Majumdar noted that Paes was a direct descendant of 19th-century Bengali poet and dramatist Michael Madhusudan Dutt, and said his joining would boost the party’s prospects in Bengal.
It was not immediately clear if Paes would contest the upcoming West Bengal assembly elections.
A recipient of the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna, Padma Shri and Padma Bhushan, Paes is widely credited with bringing tennis to a mainstream Indian audience over a distinguished career spanning four decades.
(With inputs from PTI)
This post was last modified on March 31, 2026 2:22 pm