A 57-year-old man died by suicide at his home in Khardah on Tuesday after holding the “NRC” responsible for his death, touching off a political slugfest that saw Mamata Banerjee ripping into the BJP’s “politics of fear and division” and the saffron party slamming the Bengal chief minister for triggering “mass panic”.

Mamata sees the special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls as a “backdoor NRC”. The mention of the NRC (National Register of Citizens) in Pradeep Kar’s purported suicide note handed her fresh ammo to sharpen her attack on the BJP.

The BJP accused her of weaving a “false narrative” by linking the NRC with the SIR.

The Election Commission had on Monday announced the SIR in nine states and three Union Territories, including poll-bound Bengal.

Representatives of parties who attended Bengal chief electoral officer Manoj Kumar Agarwal’s meeting on the SIR on Tuesday said Kar’s death dominated the discussions.

“It shakes me to the very core to imagine how, for years, BJP has tormented innocent citizens with the threat of NRC, spreading lies, stoking panic and weaponising insecurity for votes. They have turned constitutional democracy into a draconian law-regime, where people are made to doubt their own right to exist. This tragic death is the direct consequence of BJP’s venomous propaganda. Those who sit in Delhi and preach nationalism have pushed ordinary Indians to such despair that they are dying in their own land, fearing they will be declared ‘FOREIGNERS’,” Mamata posted on X on Tuesday.

Police said Kar’s family had told them that he had been reading about the NRC, and the announcement of the SIR in Bengal had left him restless.

The NRC is a register of all genuine Indian citizens living in the country and abroad and has been implemented only in Assam so far. Its purpose is to differentiate between legal citizens and illegal immigrants.

The SIR seeks to ensure that the names of only eligible citizens are included in the electoral rolls.

Many fear that the BJP-led Centre will link the two exercises, and people whose names do not appear on the electoral rolls after the SIR might not make it to the NRC.

Barrackpore police commissioner Murlidhar Sharma visited Kar’s home.

Sharma said: “His family told us that he was restless since the announcement of the SIR in Bengal on Monday. He had his dinner and went to his room. When he didn’t open the door in the morning, the family informed the police. The door had to be broken, and he was found hanging. He was taken to a hospital where he was declared dead.”

Chandrima Bhattacharya, Bengal’s minister of state (independent charge) for finance and health and family welfare, also visited Kar’s home, around 25km north of Calcutta.

“Our chief minister has clearly mentioned that we will not let anything happen in the name of the NRC. Please do not get scared. There is a rule on who can get citizenship even after coming from Bangladesh... everything has to be done within the rules. Now, new terminologies are being introduced to break the rules. That is not correct,” Bhattacharya said.

Kar’s neighbours said his name figured on the voter list of 2002, a prerequisite for enrolment in the fresh list that would be finalised after the SIR.

Many in Bengal, especially those with roots in Bangladesh, are anxious about the documents they would need to furnish or the challenges they might encounter while trying to establish their credentials.

Mamata demanded that the Centre “stop this heartless game once and for all”.

“Bengal will never allow NRC, and never allow anyone to strip our people of their dignity or belonging. Our soil belongs to Maa, Mati, Manush, not to those who thrive on hate. Let the Delhi zamindars hear this loud and clear: Bengal will resist, Bengal will protect and Bengal will prevail… 57-year-old Pradeep Kar from 4 Mahajyoti Nagar, Panihati, Khardaha (Ward No. 9) has taken his own life, leaving behind a note that says, ‘NRC is responsible for my death’. What greater indictment can there be of the BJP’s politics of fear and division?” she wrote on X.

This was the second reported NRC-related death in Calcutta and its adjoining areas in the past three months.

In August, Dilip Kumar Saha, a non-teaching staff member of a private school in Dhakuria, committed suicide, triggering allegations that reports of an impending NRC in Bengal drove him to take his own life.

Saha had arrived in Calcutta in 1972 from Nawabganj in Dhaka and had been living in Anandapally at Regent Park.

He did not have a birth certificate and was scared that he would be separated from his family, sent to a detention camp and eventually deported to Bangladesh, Saha’s family had said.

Till now, Assam is the only state to have updated the NRC. The final NRC, released on August 31, 2019, left out over 1.9 million people, leading to uncertainty over their
citizenship.

Since the publication of the list, the NRC process in Assam has remained stalled.

The Centre has not announced any further steps regarding the excluded individuals.

The Assam government, led by chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, has contested the list, saying the number of excluded people should have been much higher.

While updating the NRC, people whose names appeared on the 1951 NRC in Assam and the names of Indian citizens, including their descendants who moved to the state after March 24, 1971, were considered. Those whose names appeared on any voter list in Assam till March 24, 1971, were also added.

People who came from Bangladesh between January 1, 1966, and March 24, 1971, and registered themselves with the Foreigner Regional Registration Office and were declared by the Foreigner Tribunal as Indian citizens were considered as well.