Dasgupta started as a
Trotskite during college but became a
Thatcherite in England; since then, he has self-identified with
centre-right politics. Dasgupta has been active in national politics since the early 90s as a member of the
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP); he believed in the potential of the
Mandal Commission recommendations and the
Ram Rath Yatra to forge a common Hindu identity.
Mushirul Hasan, writing in 1997, held him the chief spokesperson of BJP in the English language press. In the early 2000s, Dasgupta blogged: Throughout these years, Dasgupta emphasized the value of English in reaching out to the elites — who were allegedly mass-committed to the left-liberal cause — and winning them over towards
Hindutva; he was one of the most fierce critics of the pro-vernacular policies followed by the communist government of
West Bengal.
Legislation In April 2016, the incumbent
BJP government nominated Dasgupta to the
Rajya Sabha as an eminent personality in literature; his term would have continued till 2022. However, in 2021, Dasgupta resigned from Rajya Sabha to contest the
Legislative Assembly election in West Bengal for BJP from
Tarakeswar; he lost by over 7000 votes. A month later, Dasgupta was renominated to the
Rajya Sabha for the remainder of his original term — opposition politicians and constitutional scholars questioned the legal soundness of the renomination. == Reception ==