Bengal’s battle of words heats up
Union Home Minister Amit Shah and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday traded allegations and snide remarks in equal measure, ramping up campaign rhetoric before next year’s West Bengal Assembly elections.
This was after Shah, in Bengal for a three-day visit to kick start BJP’s poll campaign, accused the Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee of having engendered “fear, corruption, and misgovernance” over the 15 years that she has been in charge of the eastern State.
To begin with, Shah tried to set the Bengal BJP’s election agenda for the 2026 Assembly election by criticising the Mamata Government’s alleged policy of sheltering Bangladeshi infiltrators to fuel its vote bank politics. He vowed to expel all infiltrators after the BJP came to power in the State, post-April 15.
Mamata compared Shah to Dushasana, the villainous character from the epic Mahabharata, while the Home Minister accused the West Bengal CM of being a facilitator of Bangladeshi infiltrators in Bengal, endangering the safety and security of the entire country.
Launching a no-holds-barred attack on the Trinamool Congress, Shah, who was in Kolkata on a two-day organisational trip, said, “I want to ask Mamata Banerjee to show a single State in the country that resists border fencing. Whenever you take up the issue, you oppose the Citizenship Amendment Act or the lifting of Article 370. She criticises the Border Security Force (BSF) for infiltration. My question is, why aren’t your local administration and police stations arresting the infiltrators?”
Accusing the Chief Minister of protecting infiltrators, Shah said infiltration would stop when the BJP came to power. “Not only will we drive away the infiltrators, but we’ll also strengthen the borders in such a way that not even a single insect will be able to infiltrate. The BJP will come to power in Bengal with a two-thirds majority,” Shah said.
Attacking the Chief Minister for running a thoroughly corrupt regime, Shah hit Banerjee by invoking the Bhaipo (nephew) term for the first time in many months, alleging, “The TMC has left its mark in every field where there’s corruption. There’s the Mamata Government — from chit funds to syndicate raj to job rackets, corruption and more. Only the Bhaipo has the right to make money.”
The CM, on her part, hit back at a rally in Borjora and announced that — unlike 2021, when there was a khela (game) during the elections — in 2026, there’ll be a fata fati khela (fierce game).
Referring to the infiltration issue, Banerjee said, “Here, we are dealing with the pupils of Shakuni Mama (uncle Shakuni, a villainous character in Mahabharata). My question is, who minds the borders? Who deals with the BSF? How many times will you ask for land? We give you land, but you did nothing with it, and now you’re accusing us.”
She further said, “You’ve widened the jurisdiction of the BSF to usurp the State Government’s power indirectly. When you failed to win the elections, you resorted to Special Intensive Revision (SIR) by influencing the Election Commission of India (ECI). But you still won’t be able to win because there won’t just be a khela (game), but a fata-fati khela (fierce game) this time round.”
She said, “Today, Dushasana has come to Bengal, and whenever there are elections, Duryodhanas and Dushasanas come here in hordes.” She asked, “If infiltration is a problem in Bengal, then what about Jammu and Kashmir?” referring to the Pahalgam attack. Referring to the Delhi blasts, she wondered whether infiltrators were present only in Bengal or not in other parts of the country. “What happened in Delhi a few weeks ago?” she asked.
In an apparent rebuttal to Shah’s ‘Bhaipo’ remark, the Chief Minister said, “You always talk about dynastic rule, but what about the fact that you send your children to lead international sports organisations where they deal with thousands of crores of rupees?”
