Shah draws Bengal battle lines
Home Minister Amit Shah on Wednesday identified two key issues of trans-border infiltration and corruption as the prime election agenda for the 2026 Bengal elections polls even as he asked a general meeting of party workers at Science City auditorium in Kolkata, to etch his portent in their hearts that the BJP was winning Bengal this year.
Dil pe likh lo, isbaar humari sarkar (write this in your heart) … We will win Bengal by two-third margin … and set about to win in at least 20 out of 28 districts of the State … believe me we are going to win the elections in 2026,” Shah told his party men asking them to reach out to the voters with a two-pronged election plank telling them how “infiltration and corruption have been institutionalised in Bengal.”
He told the grassroot workers “if these two issues are not addressed immediately then the situation will spin out of control. The danger of infiltration is particularly clear and imminent and those who are living in the city will soon understand what is going to happen.”
Shah’s ‘election guidelines’ came to his party men almost in tandem with a fierce attack being launched by another BJP leader Sambit Patra who during a speech in Odisha slammed West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for threatening the Home Minister. “This is the first time a Home Minister is being threatened in Bengal,” Patra said quoting Banerjee on her Tuesday’s speech whence she said, Shah was hiding in his hotel in Kolkata.
The Home Minister who later prayed at the iconic Thanthaniya Kali Bari (temple) at the historic College Street in Kolkata was also quoted as asking his party MLAs and MPs to remain confined in their respective constituencies as “the MLAs would be reconsidered for nominations only based on their performance,” a senior leader coming out of the meeting said adding “he also asked the MPs to regularly visit their constituencies and the MLAs to remain stationed in their areas for at least four days in a week.”
Referring to the Trinamool Congress’ Maa Maati Manush (mother earth and mankind) tagline Shah said in Bengal “Maa is in veritable danger as the women are unsafe while Manush or the people have to constantly migrate out of the State in search of jobs (for lack of industrial development) and the Maati or the earth is being regularly occupied by the infiltrators.”
Trinamool Congress however promptly hit back saying the BJP top brass had just started to visit Bengal with their “false promises.” State TMC vice president JP Majumdar said, “Now Amit Shah has come … then Prime Minister Modi will come with his entire entourage of BJP’s who’s who but the result will be the same … they will once again be defeated like in 2021 and 2024 …this time they will not win more than 50 seats.”
