Mamata Banerjee on Friday said two-thirds of 90 lakh people whose names were struck off the electoral roll in Bengal appeared to be Hindus, suggesting that even the section that the BJP claimed to protect was not spared by the contentions SIR drive.
“I saw it in news reports... out of 90 lakh people who have been deleted, 60 lakh are Hindus and 30 lakh are Muslims. Mota Bhai (Union home minister Amit Shah) has deleted voters indiscriminately,” the Trinamool Congress chairperson said before a sea of supporters at Swarupnagar in North 24-Parganas.
“They always claim something and do something very different.... They have no loyalties, they look after none,” she added.
Sources on the Election Commission said they didn’t have the religion-wise data of people whose names were deleted from the voter list.
The Trinamool ecosystem has been propagating through social media that nearly 63 per cent of the disenfranchised people are Hindus, while 34 per cent are Muslims.
At a news conference to issue a point-by-point rebuttal to Union home minister Amit Shah’s claims and the BJP’s poll promises for Bengal, Trinamool national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee iterated the same numbers.
Sources in the BJP said Trinamool’s poll consultant, I-PAC, was promoting “unreliable, misleading” numbers to promote the view that the SIR hurt Hindus more than Muslims.
“The tribunals have not even started working. Ninety lakh people have been removed. Every agency of this country is dancing to the tune of the BJP. It seems that everything has been sold as if a (yearender, clearance sale) is going on,” said Mamata.
“You might even be able to trust a snake once, but you can’t trust the BJP.... In Assam (in the NRC exercise), 19 lakh people were sent to detention camps. 13 lakh people were Hindus and six lakh people were Muslims,” she added.
“I would urge people to appeal before the tribunals. We will provide legal support. In the coming days, the names of legitimate voters will get re-enrolled in the electoral roll. Make sure that not a single vote is cast in favour of the BJP or communal people.”
Later, at Basirhat, the chief minister persisted with the ophidian references.
“Do not allow yourselves to get misled by the lies of the BJP. Vote for Trinamool.... The BJP is a double-headed snake. They will bite once before the elections. They will bite again after the elections,” she said.
In Barasat, Mamata asked the BJP to be prepared for what happens after August 2026 — a month she has marked for a potential reckoning.
“Sooner or later, justice will be served to you (the BJP). Be prepared for what happens after August 2026,” she said.
“If you (the people of Bengal) want to safeguard your language, rights and identity, then cast your vote... in favour of the TMC and none other,” added the chief minister.
Multiple BJP insiders have expressed apprehensions in private over the outcome of the SIR.
“Nobody in the BJP actually knew whether the SIR was failsafe in the special case of this partitioned border state with oh-so-many Hindu refugees,” said a BJP insider on condition of anonymity.
“This exercise gloriously backfiring on us in Bengal was always a distinct possibility. If that has indeed happened, it would sink us,” he added. “Ram help us all.”