Kolkata, Jul 21 : Sharpening her ‘Bengali asmita’ (pride) pitch ahead of the 2026 West Bengal assembly polls, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday accused the BJP of unleashing “linguistic terrorism” on Bengalis, asserting that the fight for identity and language will continue till the saffron party is defeated, both in the state and at the Centre.
If linguistic profiling doesn’t stop, the resistance movement will reach Delhi, she asserted.
Addressing the TMC Martyrs’ Day rally in Kolkata, Banerjee gave a clarion call to defeat the saffron party in the 2026 polls and eventually oust the BJP from power at the Centre.
“There will be a language movement against the BJP’s terrorism on the Bengali language… From July 27, the language movement will start in West Bengal in protest against attacks on Bengalis,” Banerjee thundered before a massive turnout at the rally venue in central Kolkata.
“We have to win more seats in the 2026 assembly polls, and then march to Delhi to defeat the BJP,” she asserted.
Banerjee’s fierce speech touched upon a wide range of issues from NRC notices in West Bengal to the “targeting” of Bengalis in BJP-ruled states, including allegedly putting them in detention camps and attempts to remove their names from electoral rolls.
“In 2019, they vandalised the statue of Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar. Now, they have issued notifications to delete the names of Bengalis from the voter list. In BJP-ruled states, Bengalis are being harassed and put in detention camps,” she alleged.
Attacking Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, she said, “He cannot handle his own state but is meddling in the affairs of West Bengal. I urge Sushmita Dev to organise a massive protest in Assam. We will all join.”
Banerjee said that West Bengal hosts around 1.5 crore migrants from other states, but they have never faced harassment.
“We welcome people from all over India, but look at what the BJP is doing to Bengalis. Who gave the Assam government the right to send NRC notices to residents of Bengal?” she said.
Banerjee also launched a blistering attack on the Election Commission, accusing it of working at the BJP’s behest.
“The BJP and the Election Commission are conspiring against West Bengal. They want to do in West Bengal what they did in Bihar through EC’s SIR. If they try the same here, we will gherao them. We will never allow it,” he added. (PTI)
