Chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday alleged her Assembly constituency of Bhabanipur was being filled with outsiders in a "planned manner", suggesting that Trinamool Congress voters were being reduced in numbers there.
The chief minister sent an audio message from north Bengal for a Trinamool Congress-organised Vijaya Dashami get-together in her seat, in which she said: "Bhabanipur is being filled with the bohiragoto (outsiders), being done by planning."
The Trinamool chief directed the local leadership of the party to seriously look into this.
Nearly one out of every two Bhabanipur electors is a non-Bengali.
The socio-economically diverse, cosmopolitan Assembly constituency has around 80 per cent non-Muslim votes, with Hindus, Sikhs and Jains in large numbers.
"I see nowadays that in many places, slums of the poor are being demolished and big residential projects are being built there. I do not support this. Our voters are being driven away. Bhabanipur is being filled with outsiders in a planned manner," Mamata said.
In the September 2021 bypoll, Mamata had won Bhabanipur by a record margin of 58,832 votes, securing nearly 72 per cent of the vote share.
Her message on Tuesday is significant against the backdrop of the BJP having drastically lowered the gap with Trinamool in the Bhabanipur Assembly segment by over 50,000 votes in the Lok Sabha election last year for Kolkata Dakshin. The ruling party’s lead was merely 8,297.
The chief minister clarified that all those who come to live and work in this state are Bengal's people.
"But those who suddenly come from outside, spend lots of money, buy land and homes, and then displace the local people, they are outsiders," she said.
Booth-wise data from the Election Commission of India reveals that the BJP in 2024 led from 149 of the 269 booths in the Assembly segment, and from five of the eight Kolkata Municipal Corporation wards that the segment comprises. In the September 2021 bypoll, Mamata had led in all eight wards.
The five wards the BJP led in 2024 are 63 (parts of Chowringhee, Taltala, Park Street, Shakespeare Sarani, the Maidan and Hastings), 70 (Jadu Babu’s Bazaar), 71 (Bhowanipore), 72 (Chakraberia, Padmapukur and Bakulbagan), and 74 (Alipore).
Trinamool led in three wards, 73 (parts of Bhowanipore, Patuapara, and Kalighat), 77 (parts of Kidderpore), and 82 (Chetla).