At a rally in Manikchak in Malda, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee accused central agencies of targeting innocent people after the recent violence in Mothabari, where judicial officers were gheraoed by a protesting crowd.

She said those responsible had escaped.

“Two communal parties gheraoed the judges and escaped. Now, investigators are harassing innocent locals in the name of the NIA. They have picked up some 50 innocent people in the name of investigation,” she said, referring to the Indian Secular Front and the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen.

The probe has been handed to the National Investigation Agency after directions from the Supreme Court of India. The state CID has arrested 35 people so far. Mamata shifted focus to voter list deletions.

At the rally, she asked people to raise their hands if their names had been removed. A large number responded.

“There is no need to hold political rallies and meetings of our party. My priority is to extend help to these people to apply before tribunals to include the names wrongly deleted from the electoral rolls,” she said.

She asked people not to approach judicial officers handling cases linked to the Special Intensive Revision process, and instead file applications before tribunals. Targeting Union home minister Amit Shah, she blamed him for the deletions.

Addressing him as “Motabhai”, she said, “I challenge Amit Shah to hold a meeting here in Malda and speak to the people whose names were deleted. The BJP must fall at people's feet and beg for their forgiveness for bringing them this misery. I ask people to exact revenge for name deletions through EVMs.”

Her remarks come days after the Mothabari violence, where seven judicial officers were held inside a BDO office and another was confined in a vehicle for hours. The protest turned violent, with road blockades, damage to vehicles and attacks on police.

She also warned party workers to stay alert. “Do not fall for any provocation. The BJP wants to stoke violence and then use central agencies to pick up people as they did in Mothabari,” she said.

She alleged that money was being brought into the state before the polls and asked women to guard EVMs and VVPAT machines after voting. At another rally in Gazole, she spoke about the Waqf Amendment Act.

“Some people are spreading false information about the Waqf Act. One must remember that we fought against its implementation, and the matter is now in the hands of the Imams. We did not let the BJP take the matter into its own hands,” she said.

The issue had earlier led to violence in Murshidabad district in April 2025. The state later agreed to implement the law and asked officials to upload data on over 82,000 waqf properties to the Centre’s UMEED portal by December that year.