Four Trinamool MPs on Monday staged a sit-in protest at Jai Hind Camp near Vasant Kunj against the alleged discrimination of Bengali-speaking migrant workers in BJP-ruled Delhi.
Residents at this slum, mostly poor migrants from Bengal who work as daily wage earners, domestic workers and ragpickers, are facing multiple problems after electricity was disconnected on July 8 following a court order. They are also living in fear of demolition of their homes.
The delegation of MPs Sukhendu Sekhar Roy, Dola Sen, Sagarika Ghose and Saket Gokhale demanded immediate restoration of electricity at Jai Hind Camp.
The protest that began at 3pm will continue for 24 hours. The MPs sat at the site in rotation. By evening, when Sen and Ghose were present on the site, hundreds of residents had joined the dharna.
On Sunday, a delegation of Trinamool MPs had visited the settlement where around 3,000 people live, to witness their plight first-hand. It came in the wake of chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s concern for the people of Jai Hind Camp living without
power supply.
Her party’s MPs on Monday also demanded the Delhi government not to demolish the homes at this settlement.
Trinamool MP Sen said that the BJP was setting new narratives to harass Bengali-speaking people by accusing them of being Bengladeshi and Rohingya infiltrators despite these people having valid documents to prove their Indian citizenship.
“In order to harass the people of Jai Hind Camp, they (the BJP government) first cut their power supply and stopped water supply. Now these people are living in fear that their houses will be demolished,” Sen said. “We will not let it happen. We are sitting here to support them,” she said.
“We will fight for the freedom of Bengali-speaking people,” Sen said, adding that the “conspiracy” and “injustice” of the BJP would fall flat. She claimed that in the 2029 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP would get fewer than 200 seats.
Her party colleague and fellow MP Ghose said the BJP labelled Indian citizens as “Bangladeshis” to humiliate Bengali speakers.
“You are human, I am human. Hindus or Muslims, we have always respected each other,” Ghose said, adding that the BJP plays the politics of dividing people and spreading hate in the name of language, region and religion.
Ghose said that workers like the residents of Jai Hind Camp contributed to building malls in Vasant Kunj, roads and highways. Many Muslim residents collected funds to build a temple in Jai Hind Camp, she pointed out.
Sen reminded the residents that Trinamool had scheduld a mega rally under Mamata’s leadership in Calcutta on July 16 against the BJP for targeting Bengali-speaking citizens in their own country.
Trinamool leaders also arranged generators to provide lights and cooler at the Jai Hind Camp community hall.
Residents of the slum expressed their gratitude to Trinamool and Mamata.
“Didi always takes a stand for us (Bengali people) in Bengal or any other state,” Johanara, a domestic worker, said.
Expressing hope that electricity would be restored and they would not be thrown out,
Ainuddin Hussain, a driver, told this paper that living without electricity for six days was proving to be extremely tough for the elderly and children in this heat. “Many of us have shifted our elderly relatives to other locations,” he said.