The BJP’s Suvendu Adhikari kept pushing the hardline Hindutva envelope in a speech peppered with communal overtones at a “sanatani solidarity” rally in Haldia on Sunday.
Urging Hindus to unite here with the sole aim of unseating the Mamata Banerjee government in the 2026 Assembly polls, Adhikari spoke in a language that even sections in his party, the BJP, are unsure of in an essentially pluralist, inclusive state like Bengal.
Adhikari said at the rally: “If five per cent more Hindu votes come to the BJP, we will win.”
“We will not let Bengal turn into another Bangladesh,” he added, suggesting that might happen should Mamata get another stint in power. “I am ready to be martyred for saving my religion.”
A few hundred BJP workers participated in the 2km rally through the East Midnapore township, as a countermeasure to the party’s Haldia MLA Tapasi Mondal defecting to Mamata’s party recently, attributing it to being unable to tolerate Adhikari polarisation thrust.
“These rallies announce the unification of all Hindus, which will cause the inevitable fall of their Muslim League regime (referring to the Trinamool Congress) next year. Mamata Banerjee’s Muslim-appeasement and her allowing atrocities on Hindus by the jihadis across Bengal will bring her downfall as soon as Hindus unite,” Adhikari said.
Avowedly secular and pluralist for over two decades, till he was with the Trinamool till December 2020, Adhikari, now the leader of the Opposition in the Bengal Assembly, seems to have turned increasingly communal since joining the BJP.
When the turmoil in Bangladesh intensified, Adhikari sensed in it an opportunity to push the envelope to consolidate Hindu votes through polarisation. He has repeatedly claimed to be the principal voice of all of Bengal’s Hindus, which has not gone down well with some in his party.
Several cliques in the BJP leadership from their divided Bengal unit have admitted in private to their discomfort over Adhikari’s verbal vitriol against Muslims, who form a third of the population in this state.
Minorities decide the electoral outcome of around 120 of the state’s 294 seats.