Speaking In Bengali Does Not Mean Bangladeshi: Mamata Banerjee Slams BJP

Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee held a massive footmarch in Kolkata against the Special Intensive Revision of voter list that was rolled out by the Election Commission today across a number of states.  The 3.8 km march started at the Red Road in the heart of Kolkata and ended at the Jorashanko Thakur Bari -- the ancestral home of Rabindranath Thakur.

Launching a sharp attack on the BJP, Banerjee said, "Many unorganised sector workers are thinking whether their names will be removed".

Going to the heart of BJP's concern - that illegal migrants are being given a permanent home and fake identity in the state -- she said speaking in Bengali does not mean Bangladeshi, "just like speaking in Hindi or Punjabi does not mean Pakistani". 

"Whoever is talking in Bangla is branded as Bangladeshi. These people have not fought the fight for freedom... where was BJP at that time? That is why they don't know that India, Bangladesh and Pakistan were part of the same land before Independence," she added.

Banerjee's Trinamool Congress has been vehemently against the rollout of SIR -- as it was against the imposition of National Register of Citizens. The party, as well as the rest of the Opposition, contends that SIR is just a means to disenfranchise their supporters and ensure a mandate for the BJP.

With the assembly election due in Bengal on which the BJP long has its eye, the Trinamool today called SIR a "silent, invisible rigging". 

Branding the revision exercise "hurried and politically motivated", Mamata Banerjee said it is being conducted only in Opposition-ruled states like Kerala, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal, "but not in BJP-ruled Assam".

Assembly elections are due next year in Kerala and Tamil Nadu as well.

Calling it a "clear discrimination aimed at helping the ruling party at the Centre," the Chief Minister said the Election Commission "must also reply why there is no SIR in BJP-ruled Assam, Tripura and other northeastern states".

The rally comes a day after the BJP wrote to the Election Commission, claiming that the Mamata Banerjee government has issued "backdated" and "forged" documents on a large scale and urging the poll body to exercise great caution while determining Indian citizens.

Read: For Bengal Roll Revision, BJP Red Flags 5 of 12 Approved Documents

In its list of documents for which "caution" should be exercised, the party included Birth Certificates, Permanent Residence Certificates, Forest Rights Certificates, Caste Certificates, Family Registers and Land and House Allotment Certificates.

It also suggested that the poll commission seek some extra documents from the residents of the state.