CHENNAI: Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin on August 4 strongly condemned the Delhi police’s description of the Bengali language as Bangladeshi language.
He termed it a direct insult to the language in which the country’s national anthem was written.
He concurred with the strong condemnation expressed by West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee. Stalin, responding to her post on social media platform X, said such statements by the Delhi police, which come under Union Home Ministry, are 'not inadvertent errors or slips'.
“They expose the dark mindset of a regime that consistently undermines diversity and weaponises identity,” he said.
Stalin said that in the face of such an assault on non-Hindi languages, Banerjee was standing as a shield for the language and the people of West Bengal.
“She will not let this attack pass without a fitting response,” he added.
Banerjee, in her post, referred to a letter from Inspector of Police of Lodhi Colony station in New Delhi regarding the arrest of eight persons suspected to be Bangladeshi nationals residing illegally in India.
The letter sent to Banga Bhawan, the office of the resident commission of the West Bengal government in Delhi, requesting translation, said, "The identification documents contain texts written in Bangladeshi and need to be translated to Hindi and English."
Banerjee had said that describing a language spoken by crores of Indians and sanctified by the Constitution as Bangladeshi is scandalous, insulting, anti-national, and unconstitutional.
“This insults all Bengali-speaking people of India. They cannot use this kind of language which degrades and debases us all,” she said.