BJP not to give up on politics of polarisation in Bengal

Dubbing chief minister Mamata Banerjee “anti-Hindu”, the BJP will launch a door-to-door campaign from Friday (March 13), scaling up its polarisation attempt ahead of next year’s assembly elections in the state, which has over 27 per cent Muslim population.

A four-page booklet, containing 10-charges against Banerjee and her government, will be circulated during the mass-contact drive. Three segments of the booklets dwell on the alleged “minority appeasement” of the Banerjee-led TMC government and how it purportedly discriminates against Hindus.

The main charges contained in the booklet titled “No more injustice” indicate that despite failure of its vitriolic anti-minority diatribes to swing Delhi elections in its favour, the BJP is not yet ready to give up on politics of polarisation, a political cash cow that helped the party rise in national politics.

Moreover, with 2.46 crore Muslims, West Bengal is a fertile ground for polarisation and the BJP has been painstakingly preparing ground for it over the years, branding almost half of the minority population of the state as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

BJP state president Dilip Ghosh claims there are 1 crore illegal Muslims in the state.

In its proposed outreach campaign, the BJP would prominently raise the issue of “influx” of illegal migrants from Bangladesh, considering the state’s demographic composition that includes a large number of Muslims as well as Hindu refugees, who migrated from Bangladesh during various waves of communal strife in that country.

Related news: BJP will come to power next in West Bengal, says Amit Shah

The BJP would tell voters that under the patronage of the ruling TMC, illegal migrants were not only acquiring voting rights but also putting pressure on the state’s economy and posing threat to national security, said a member of the BJP’s state media cell, who is privy to the contents in the booklet.

The booklet will also highlight Banerjee’s anti-NRC and anti-CAA stance, accusing her of working against the interest of Hindu refugees to “appease” minorities.

“The country was partitioned in 1947 with the assumption that West Bengal would be the homeland of Bengali Hindus. But the erstwhile Left Front government and the current TMC regime have over the years only tortured Bengali Hindus,” the booklet mentions, playing the Hindu victimhood card.

To further buttress its “anti-Hindu” charge against the chief minister, the booklet claims that the state government-orchestrated attacks on Ram Navami processions in the state and a youth who chanted “Jai Shri Ram” was sent to jail last year.

The BJP had come out with a similar ‘chargesheet’ against Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party government ahead of Delhi elections. In a segment in the ‘document’ called ‘Delhi ko jalane ki sajish‘ (conspiracy to burn Delhi) the AAP was accused of instigating violence during anti-CAA protests in the national capital.

That the BJP would pick up its campaign in Bengal from where it left in Delhi was evident during home minister Amit Shah’s March 1 public rally in Kolkata, where party’s campaign theme “Aar noy Anyay (No more injustice) was formulated.  A group of BJP activists en route to the rally even chanted “goli maro…….” an incendiary slogan that was coined during assembly elections in Delhi held last month.  When the five BJP activists, who had been arrested for raising the infamous slogan, were released on bail on March 6, around 50-60 party workers went to the Bankshal Court in Kolkata to receive them with garlands.

As in Delhi, the violent anti-CAA protests in West Bengal, along with the claim of unabated influx of Muslims from Bangladesh, too will be the ready metaphor for the BJP to try polarising electorates in Bengal.

The TMC however, at least in public, slighted off the charges. The party’s secretary-general Partha Chatterjee claimed, the people of the state would not buy such allegations as they were aware that the BJP epitomised “economic and social injustices.”

On the ground, particularly in bordering districts, the BJP’s incendiary ploy seems to be working as has been evident from the response the party is getting in the strings of pro-CAA rallies and meetings it organised.

Related news: Our govts shot anti-CAA protesters like dogs: West Bengal BJP chief

“Mamata is not Kejriwal and Bengal is not Delhi. Unlike Kejriwal, Mamata has cultivated a pro-minority image for herself as the community has been playing an important role in her party’s successive victories since 2011. She cannot also afford to completely shun that image now, more so as Asaduddin Owaisi of the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen has decided to make a foray into the state,” opined senior journalist and author Subir Bhaumik.

He said, to offset the BJP’s Hindutva plank, Banerjee would have to do a tight-rope walk, balancing her pro-Minority image with her Hindu identity, particularly when her government’s track record of governance is not perceived as impressive as AAP’s.

Since the run-up to the last Lok Sabha elections, the TMC supremo has never missed any opportunity to flaunt her Hindu identity and her “knowledge” of the scriptures. During the Lok Sabha election campaign, she had even challenged prime minister Narendra Modi and Shah to compete with her in Sanskrit sloka recitations.

She has also been careful that her anti-CAA stance should not be misconstrued as being anti-Hindu refugees.

“Mamata Banerjee distributed land pattas to the refugees in the state. She never considered differentiating refugees from citizens,” said the president of North Dinajpur TMC committee Kanaiyalal Agarwal.

From a government programme in the district last week, the chief minister announced that all Hindu refugees who had come from Bangladesh and cast their votes are already Indian citizens and need not apply for citizenship afresh.

Will her counter outreach dent BJP’s Hindutva offensive? To know it Bengal will not have to wait till assembly elections next year.  The prelude to the assembly battle will be scripted when 107 municipalities across the state and Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) will go to poll in April-May.

As around 60 per cent voters of the state will take part in these elections, both the BJP and TMC will use the civic polls as a launchpad for the assembly elections and test the water. This explains why poll bugle has already been blown in the state, more than a year ahead of assembly elections.