Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday hit out at the BJP-Election Commission "got-up game" of the special intensive revision (SIR) process, vowing to move court again to challenge the mass deletions, and questioned the very purpose of establishing tribunals to hear the appeals of the disenfranchised if the electoral roll for the 2026 Assembly polls was to be "frozen" before tribunals could do their job.
Moments after filing her nomination for the Bhabanipur seat at Alipore’s Survey Building, the Trinamool Congress chief lambasted the "deviously designed" process to weed out names of anti-BJP electors, and by corollary, people likely to vote for her.
In addresses to supporters at Alipore and rallies in Hooghly, Mamata framed the 2026 state polls as a fight to the finish for people's right to their homeland.
Mamata mocked Team Gyanesh Kumar's logical framework, exclusive to Bengal among all SIR-bound states, and questioned the legal recourse that slams the door on the very voters it was meant to protect.
“You cannot defeat Trinamool Congress by deleting names. We'll move court again to resist the exclusion of names,” she said, highlighting the "got-up game" between the BJP and the EC.
“We will fight legally to get the names included in the list in accordance with the Constitution. If people cannot cast their votes, what was the need for the tribunal(s)? Then you say the list has been frozen? What is this? We will challenge this again," she said. "I respect the Supreme Court, but I'm not satisfied.... I am unable to digest this (the freezing of the list). There are times when I feel like going back to practise law... but cannot to do so because I am in the (chief minister's) chair."
She alleged the targeted removal of millions was to fulfill what she called the Sangh Parivar's aspirations. At Balagarh, she accused the EC of intimidating people over the phone.
“It (the EC) works under orders from the BJP. It is calling people over the phone to threaten and intimidate them,” she claimed.
Her imagery remained visceral, likening the SIR to a "venomous serpent" waiting to strike at the state’s democratic fabric.
“In the name of the SIR, they have destroyed lives of so many. They have targeted Bengal and hatched conspiracies.... In the guise of deleting votes, they are conspiring to implement the NRC. We will never let their sinister plans succeed,” she said.
Mamata alleged a majot cartographic threat to the state’s integrity, an emotive issue for a people twice-Partitioned since 1905.
"It (the BJP) is conspiring to divide the state again. In the name of delimitation, (they) are planning to carve out another state from Bengal," she said.
A Trinamool senior pointed out what Mamata said wasn't far-fetched, referring to the saffron ecosystem noise after the BJP's 2021 defeat, of outlandish demands for a trifurcation of the state, by culling out parts such as north Bengal and the Jungle Mahal (areas that voted in its favour), and giving them BJP-led governments.
In Sreerampore, her rhetoric sharpened as she questioned how the voter list for the first phase of polls could be "frozen". “With all due respect, I want to ask: despite the Supreme Court order allowing wrongly deleted voters to appeal before the tribunal, why was the voter list for the first phase frozen? Whoever has done this will never be forgiven. The BJP and Mota Bhai (Amit Shah) have deleted names. They are spreading terror,” she said.