Between July and November 2025, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee hit the streets of Kolkata twice to protest in opposition to the insurance policies of the Union authorities. Whereas it’s uncommon for Chief Ministers to descend on the streets and protest in different elements of the nation, it isn’t an unusual sight in West Bengal, notably when elections are not far away.
On November 4, the road protest by Banerjee, who can also be the Trinamool Congress (TMC) chairperson, was in opposition to the Particular Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in West Bengal.
With an identical train being carried out within the neighbouring State of Bihar a couple of months earlier, the TMC management had warned of huge protests, together with laying siege to the workplace of the Chief Electoral Officer, West Bengal, if the train was carried out by the Election Fee of India (ECI) within the State. On the finish of her march, Banerjee accused the Bharatiya Janata Celebration (BJP) on the Centre and the ECI of utilizing the SIR as a political software to intimidate voters.
Throughout the annual Martyrs’ Day rally in Kolkata on July 21, 2025, Banerjee had, whereas highlighting the plight of migrant employees from the State to different elements of nation, touched upon SIR. “Over 40 lakh voters’ names had been eliminated in Bihar. Now, you (EC) plan to do the identical in Bengal. If they struggle that right here, we’ll launch a gherao of their workplaces. We’ll organise an enormous protest,” she had mentioned earlier than lakhs of supporters.
Nonetheless, after October 29 when the ECI introduced SIR in 12 States and Union Territories, together with West Bengal, masking over 51 crore voters, the TMC reconciled with the thought of holding the train. In reality, senior Ministers of the ruling social gathering participated in an all-party assembly known as by the ECI’s West Bengal CEO.
A QR-coded voter record in Kolkata’s Sealdah space, the place individuals can examine if their names had been included within the 2002 electoral rolls.
| Picture Credit score:
The Hindu
Whereas the TMC has opposed the SIR, the BJP, which is the principal Opposition social gathering within the State, has been demanding it. Months earlier than the revision of the voter lists began, BJP leaders have been making statements reminiscent of “Folks of the State need SIR” and “No SIR, no votes”.
Tug of struggle
Ever for the reason that 2021 Meeting polls when the TMC got here to energy for the third consecutive time period, the BJP’s vote share has been on a decline. After the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, the TMC vote share stood at 46% and the BJP secured about 38% of the votes.
The BJP has been blaming the votes of “unlawful Bangladeshi immigrants” for the rising help base of the TMC. Its stance has been that the SIR was essential to disenfranchise such voters.
Chief of the Opposition within the West Bengal Meeting Suvendu Adhikari has claimed that after the train, one crore voters might be deleted from the electoral rolls of West Bengal. Now, earlier than the SIR course of has ended, the variety of electors within the State is about 7.6 crore.
The BJP chief mentioned 4 sorts of voters might be deleted from the State: those that are useless however nonetheless on the rolls, double or triple entry voters, pretend voters, and “Bangladeshi Muslims and Rohingya who’re unlawful voters”.
Throughout the first three weeks of the continued SIR, Adhikari has cited a number of discrepancies within the voters’ lists. On November 12, the BJP chief arrived on the workplace of the CEO with a big quantity of papers claiming it contained names of 13.25 lakh bogus voters, and demanded immediate motion. He additionally charged a bit of Sales space Degree Officers (BLOs) engaged within the ongoing SIR course of with working in connivance with the ruling social gathering to retain the names of these “pretend voters”.
Whereas the TMC and the BJP saved buying and selling costs over SIR, a 57-year-old in Panihati on the northern fringes of Kolkata triggered a recent controversy. Pradeep Kar died, allegedly by suicide, on October 29, a couple of days earlier than the SIR course of began. His relations mentioned that he left a notice blaming the NRC (Nationwide Register Of Residents) for his dying.
The very subsequent day TMC normal secretary Abhishek Banerjee visited the household and spoke to the media about how the dying was because of fears of SIR. The TMC has typically described SIR as an try to implement NRC from the again door within the State. “The entire of Bengal is now saying one factor: ‘Justice for Pradeep Kar’,” the TMC chief mentioned. This echoed the emotion from ‘Justice for R.G. Kar’, a slogan that rocked the State a 12 months in the past when a postgraduate trainee physician was raped and killed inside Kolkata’s R.G. Kar Hospital and Medical Faculty.
In the meantime, Kar’s neighbours mentioned he didn’t have a number of fingers on his proper hand, so it was not potential for him to write down a notice. After Kar’s dying, the TMC linked a number of suicides to fears associated to the SIR. Whereas the son of a migrant employee claimed that his father died at a hospital in Tamil Nadu, the native TMC MLA claimed the dying was because of suicide.
On November 20, the Chief Minister wrote to Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar urging him to halt the SIR in West Bengal, declaring that the “human price of constant with the train has turn out to be insufferable”. By then the TMC management started to assert that suicide deaths as a result of ongoing SIR, together with these of two BLOs, had climbed to twenty-eight.
The concern of some
Whereas individuals in West Bengal are confused and anxious, inside sure communities, concern prevails. The members of the Matua group, a sect of Hindu Namasudras (probably the most downtrodden castes) who migrated from Bangladesh to India, and thus lack legacy knowledge and, in some circumstances, paperwork, have been feeling the warmth. At Thakurnagar in North 24 Parganas, the headquarters of the All India Matua Mahasangha, TMC MP Mamata Bala Thakur is on a starvation strike with 20 others.
“The federal government had assured that slowly Matuas who got here to this facet (from Bangladesh to India) might be given citizenship. Most of us got here with nothing. It took us ages to get paperwork made. Now they’re questioning each doc?” says Bala.
The Citizenship (Modification) Act, 2019 (CAA) amends the Citizenship Act of 1955 and goals to supply aid to undocumented migrants belonging to 6 non-Muslim communities — Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi or Christian — who’ve fled non secular persecution within the neighbouring international locations of Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh and entered India on or earlier than December 31, 2014.
About 50 m from the place Bala and her supporters are on a starvation strike, a distinct state of affairs is unfolding. BJP MP and Union Minister Shantanu Thakur, who hails from the identical household as Bala, has organised a CAA camp. Right here, individuals from the Matua group can declare citizenship underneath the CAA. The camp costs ₹800 for each particular person to get enrolled, a improvement highlighted by the TMC for example of “money-making from the plight of residents”.
Saraswati Roy and her brother are each over 70 years outdated. In a state of confusion, they wait exterior the CAA camp, however are turned away as a result of they don’t have any paperwork from Bangladesh, one of many predominant standards to supply citizenship underneath the CAA. “We ran away from Bangladesh about 50 years in the past in a state of misery and violence. We got here with simply the garments on our our bodies. We didn’t have time to hold paperwork. Even when they’re providing citizenship, now we have no option to show how or once we got here from Bangladesh,” Roy says.
To register underneath CAA, an individual should declare their ancestry in Bangladesh. Because the SIR traces legacy knowledge the place names of oldsters within the 2002 voter record must be recorded within the enumeration kinds, many individuals are unwilling to say they’ve Bangladeshi origins and search citizenship underneath the CAA. Amid the confusion, senior BJP chief and the social gathering’s central observer for West Bengal, Sunil Bansal, has urged the State BJP leaders to not insist members of the Matua group to fill CAA kinds if they’re unwilling.
The issues of the marginalised
Residents of erstwhile Indian enclaves who grew to become Indian residents underneath the Land Boundary Settlement between India and Bangladesh in 2015 haven’t any paperwork previous 2015.
Joynal Abedin, a resident of Masaldanga in Cooch Behar which was a Bangladeshi enclave, says practically three weeks into the method BLOs have began accepting enumeration kinds by the nation’s latest group of residents who celebrated 10 years of citizenship in July this 12 months.
There are individuals displaced by Ganga river erosion like Khidir Field from Malda, who visited the CEO’s workplace in Kolkata declaring that their polling sales space in 2002 went underneath the river. The SIR has additionally impacted marginalised teams like transgender individuals and intercourse employees who’ve left their properties and don’t wish to return to hint their title or the title of their kin within the 2002 voter record.
Political events are organising camps in a number of areas, together with the minority-dominated areas of Malda and Murshidabad, which ship numerous migrant employees to different States. The Communist Celebration of India (Marxist) has additionally arrange help cubicles in numerous areas to assist individuals navigate the SIR course of. Supporters of the CPI(M) and different Left events have held protests exterior the workplace of the West Bengal CEO in opposition to SIR.
“We’re in favour of a flawless voters’ record. For such a listing, there was no necessity of the SIR. The accountability of this lies with the Election Fee and it has failed the individuals of India,” CPI(M) State secretary Md. Salim mentioned. The CPI(M) chief has additionally alleged irregularities on behalf of a bit of BLOs and written to the CEO on the difficulty. The CPI(M) management has additionally introduced a Statewide Bangla Bachao Yatra starting November 29, traversing about 1,100 km within the State, and ending on December 17.
Congress activists protesting in opposition to the SIR train in Kolkata.
| Picture Credit score:
PTI
The Congress social gathering, which had opposed the SIR in Bihar, has arrange a committee headed by economist Prasenjit Bose, who has expertise of working within the neighbouring State when the train was being held. The committee submitted its proposal earlier than the CEO suggesting not less than 16 adjustments to the Bihar SIR mannequin, within the context of Bengal. Just like the CPI(M), the Congress management has accused the ruling dispensation of making an attempt to affect the SIR by involving people who find themselves near it.
Over a border
The BJP management is making an attempt to tell apart between “Indian Muslims” and “Bangladeshi infiltrators”. Over the previous few days, the Hakimpur border checkpost at Swarupnagar in North 24 Parganas is brimming with individuals ready to return to Bangladesh. West Bengal shares a 2,216-km border with Bangladesh out of which 450 km nonetheless stays unfenced. The BJP says that its demand so far as the SIR is evident: “detect, delete, and deport”.
“There was a pointy improve within the variety of individuals making an attempt to return to Bangladesh over the previous few days. Often a couple of individuals cross the border day by day, however now the numbers are in three digits (the a whole bunch) every day. We’re not apprehending individuals if there aren’t any legal antecedents in opposition to them,” a senior Border Safety Pressure official mentioned.
Among the individuals who have gathered on the border checkpost admit that they’re Bangladeshi nationals. Masum Billa, a resident of Khulna in Bangladesh, says that he has been dwelling within the New City space on the outskirts of Kolkata for the previous 4 to 5 years doing odd jobs.
Whereas Billa says that he has no legitimate identification paperwork, Rokeya Bibi, who got here to India 10 years in the past from Satkhira in Bangladesh, claims that she has an Aadhaar card, a voter card, and a checking account. Rokeya says she was getting the advantages of the Lakshmir Bhandar scheme of the West Bengal authorities, which gives monetary help to ladies. The BJP management has used the picture on the border outpost to help its claims in regards to the presence of numerous unlawful voters and justify the SIR.
Other than what residents are going by way of, the SIR has turn out to be a floor for political sparring. When robust tremors had been felt throughout West Bengal on November 20 because of an earthquake that originated in Bangladesh, the BJP posted on social media: “West Bengal simply felt earthquake tremors. @MamataOfficial, was it due to SIR?”
In response, the TMC wrote: “It’s truly the bottom shaking beneath the ft of @BJP4Bengal as they stare at an imminent defeat within the 2026 Meeting elections.”
If you’re in misery, please attain out to those 24×7 helplines: KIRAN 1800-599-0019 or Aasra 9820466726
(With inputs from Moyurie Som and Shrabana Chatterjee)
shivsahay.s@thehindu.co.in