The controversial Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls to be conducted in West Bengal ahead of the Assembly elections next year, the attacks on Bengali-speaking people in many BJP-ruled states, the dubious deportation of Bengali speakers to Bangladesh, the Assam notice to a Bengal resident – these recent disparate developments have coalesced and armed Mamata Banerjee with an electoral Brahmastra in her bid to win a fourth term as Chief Minister.
That glitch on the Niti Aayog document on Bengal that had a map of Bihar on its cover page was the icing on the cake.
Bengali Asmita is under threat in BJP-ruled India is Mamata Banerjee's biggest missile – the Brahmastra. She will probably unveil it at her annual mega rally in Kolkata next week, on Monday, July 21 – the day designated by the Trinamool Congress as Shahid Diwas. But she will dipstick it on Wednesday July 16, when she personally hits the streets to protest the alleged BJP bias against Bengalis.
Not only Mamata Banerjee, her nephew and Trinamool Congress national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee will join her in the march. The last time she hit the streets was exactly 13 months ago – on 16 August last year – at the peak of the Abhaya outrage: the rape and murder of the trainee doctor at RG Kar hospital on August 9. The last time Mamata and Abhishek marched together to protest an issue – in the last few years, hard to recall. This leaves no room for doubt that July 16 will see the formal kick off of Mamata Banerjee's big bid for 2026.
Bengali identity front and centre
When the Election Commission (EC) launched the SIR of electoral rolls in Bihar on June 24, Mamata Banerjee had immediately raised the alarm of a "backdoor NRC" and claimed the same would be conducted in Bengal to disenfranchise voters before the next Assembly elections. Earlier this year, she accused the BJP of colluding with the EC to influence the upcoming Assembly polls in Bengal using fake voters after some voter cards in Bengal and some other states were detected having the exact same EPIC numbers.
Between June 24 and now, the TMC has reported a spurt in the number of Bengali-speaking migrants being detained in BJP-ruled states, even deported to Bangladesh. The TMC's charge is, if you speak in Bengali, you risk being picked up there by police. Even folks living in Bengal may not be immune, it claims, citing the case of a 50-year-old farmer in Bengal's Cooch Behar district that borders Assam who was summoned by a Foreigners Tribunal in that state to prove his citizenship by July 15.
"Xenophobic persecution," the TMC is calling it. "A witch-hunt against Bengalis."
After the Niti Aayog's cartographic blunder, mixing up Bengal and Bihar, the TMC found another flag to wave. Mamata Banerjee shot off an angry letter to the Niti Aayog top brass, claiming the "mis-label" was "a direct affront to Bengal's identity and dignity".
The latest straw has come from the Jai Hind 'slum' at Vasant Kunj in Delhi where around 1500 Bengali speaking migrant labourers had their power supply cut off since July 8. Four MPs of the TMC have been camping there, protesting the discrimination against Bengali migrants and the threat of the demolition of their homes.
BJP's bugbear– Infiltrators vs legal migrants
The BJP has, however, said on X that the Jai Hind slum power cut came after a court order as the colony is illegal and built on private land without any permission. The colony was apparently home to two kinds of Bengali speaking people: migrants from Bengal and infiltrators from Bangladesh. The BJP claims 26 Bangladeshi infiltrators were arrested from the colony in recent weeks. It is these infiltrators that need to be sent back to their own country.
"What is truly shameful is that Mamata Banerjee equates genuine residents of West Bengal with illegal infiltrators… These illegal migrants vote for the TMC, helping the party stay in power – just so the cycle of infiltration and appeasement never ends," the BJP for Bengal tweeted earlier this week. Amit Malviya reposted it.
Infiltrators versus legal migrants – this is the question into which this debate is steadily snowballing. As of now, Mamata seems to be racing ahead, skirting the infiltration issue to put the Bengali identity firmly front and centre in its campaign against the BJP.
One mistake too many
It is not as if there are no Bangladeshis slipping into Bengal and going off to distant parts of India for work. It is no one's case that that is acceptable. But with irrefutable logic, Mamata Banerjee puts the blame for infiltration squarely on the home ministry and the BSF guarding the Indo-Bangla border.
What is hard to accept is how can people speaking in Bengali be just picked up by police and deported to Bangladesh without proper verification? That is what is proving indefensible for the BJP. Samirul Islam, the TMC MP who is also chairman of the Bengal Migrants Welfare Board, says, "When detained by police in other states, the Bengal government is not informed, legitimate identity documents are rejected. These migrants end up spending 9-10 days in custody. For nothing."
And mistakes happen. The case of 31-year-old Danish Sheikh, wife Sunali and their six-year-old son is one of many being cited by the TMC. This family claims roots in Birbhum district, Bengal, and went to Delhi around 10 years ago looking for livelihood, which they made as ragpickers.On June 26, police picked them up and deported them to Dhaka, ignoring identity papers submitted.
From Dhaka, Danish managed to contact his family, which filed a missing persons' report and went to the Calcutta High Court with a habeas corpus plea on July 11. The home ministry has been asked to respond by July 16.
Challenge to opportunity
The issue has already brought the CPI-M and the Congress on to the streets of Kolkata. But not the BJP.
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be in Bengal on July 18, two days after Mamata Banerjee launches her Bengal Asmita Brahmastra. Modi and the Bengal BJP will have to think on their feet to match Mamata Banerjee’s penchant for turning challenges into opportunities.