Mamata Banerjee on Sunday mounted a fierce counter-offensive on Amit Shah, asking if the “opodartho... dangabaaj (worthless... riotmonger)” had another “marbar plan (plan to hit/kill)” for her.
The chief minister and Trinamool Congress chief was reacting to the Union home minister’s mockery on Saturday of her 2021 leg injury and 2024 head injury, ahead of the Assembly and general elections, respectively, as “bandage theatrics".
Addressing a crowd at the Patharkata football ground in Purulia’s Manbazar, Mamata tore into Shah.
“They say I walk around with bandages. Oh, you opodartho! I have fought many times to get out of the jaws of death. Why don’t you go and fetch the doctor’s reports...? Don’t you know what endless torture I have risen from, over the decades?” she asked, her voice sharpening with her signature street-fighter edge.
Mocking Shah’s so-called chargesheet against her 15-year rule, she said he ought to be issued one.
Referring to her Nandigram injury during the 2021 campaign, she again alleged the BJP was behind it. “You intentionally injured my leg last time. I was in a cast and went about the entire campaign in a wheelchair.... Is there plan to (hit/kill) me again? Before you assassinate someone’s character, there is a plan. You dangabaaj, planning something again?” she asked.
Her 2024 head injury was from an accidental fall in her room. No Opposition conspiracy was blamed for it.
Mamata reminded the crowd that she had returned from the “brink of death” repeatedly, contrasting her physical scars against the “gas balloon” lies of a Delhi leadership that allegedly did not respect the Constitution.
Trinamool insiders privately commented that “below-the-belt” personal attacks from the BJP were what they hoped for, recalling the BJP’s adverse electoral impact after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Didi-o-Didi taunts
in 2021.
“It tends to royally backfire on the BJP,” a senior leader noted, suggesting that such jibes allow Mamata to pivot from an incumbent to a victim of bullying by “outsiders”.
Mamata steered her attack toward the Bengali kitchen, a move likely to strike a visceral chord in a food-loving, non-vegetarian-majority state where culinary identity is nearly indistinguishable from political sovereignty. “If the BJP comes to power here, personal choices such as eating fish and meat will be imperilled.... In BJP-ruled states, you can’t eat fish, meat and eggs...,” she said.
Warning that a “one-sided” saffron regime would dictate the Bengali palate, the chief minister underscored the BJP’s identity as an alien, marauding force with Hindi-Hindu-Hindustan and vegetarian priorities, seeking to infringe upon the most intimate personal choices.
She also slammed the “BJP-EC nexus” over the SIR, claiming 1.2 crore names had been deleted in a “Delhi conspiracy” to rig the election outcome.
Abhishek’s red card
In Murshidabad’s Naoda, Mamata’s nephew and heir-apparent Abhishek Banerjee issued a stern warning against the “snake called BJP” and its “agents” within. “If anyone is supporting him (former Trinamool leader Humayun Kabir, an alleged BJP agent) in secret or in disguise, I urge them to play for the team whose jersey they are wearing. Otherwise, within a month, you will be shown a red card and not be allowed to enter the field,” he warned.
Additional reporting by Abhijeet Chatterjee and Alamgir Hossain