Real estate company Merlin Group has turned the Bengali into Albert Camus’s existentialist hero, Meursault, from the 1942 novella The Outsider. On the edge of a heatstroke, Camus’ hero shot an Arab at a beach in Algiers. In the peak of Kolkata summer, Bengali pride has been fatally wounded by an advertisement put out by the Merlin Group. The real estate job advertisement, now deleted from the pages of their official social media accounts, is no less than a gunshot wound that has given the Bengali a deep existentialist crisis: Have they become the real Outsider in their own city?
‘Only non-Bengali candidates preferred’
In the advertisement put out for senior managers and assistant general managers (sales), the Merlin Group laid out a list of requirements, including a “polished, well-groomed pleasing personality”. But what got the goat of the argumentative Bengali was the specification “only Non-Bengali candidates preferred”. As Bengali outrage spilled all over social media platforms, Merlin Group put out an official post on LinkedIn, expressing “sincerest regret and apologies” for what it called “an inadvertent error”.
“The advertisement mistakenly stated that only non-Bengali candidates were preferred, which was unintentional. The intent of the company was to recruit an employee with proficiency in English, Bengali and Hindi languages and knowledge of native Hindi and some local dialects to cater to an eclectic clientele; but, a junior intern mistakenly posted the position,” the LinkedIn post said.
But the damage had already been done.
As #BoycottMerlin trended on social media platforms, Kolkata journalist Renaissance Chakravorty wrote on Facebook that regionalism is prevalent everywhere in the country. “Bengalis are a notable exception. If a simple smile will help a fellow Bengali, the Bengali will make sure she doesn’t smile. But this advertisement is so brazen. The group is operating out of Bengal but specified it will hire no Bengalis. Are Bengalis, who suffer from crab mentality, realising how dire the situation is?” she posted. Chakravorty said this is a result of the typical Bengali mindset that accepts everyone else but discards one’s own.
Founder of The Cambridge School and author Sarojesh Mukerjee wrote: “I do not have a bone to chew with that for surely, everyone is entitled to his own crass racism. But surely such a strongly held belief should not be confined only to recruitment? Should they not keep Bengalis out of their buildings and sell only to non-Bengalis?”
Mukerjee may have unknowingly referred to a practice that has already started taking root in Kolkata. A high-end housing complex at a satellite city just outside Kolkata has allegedly barred the sale of any non-vegetarian items in its vicinity, as most of the apartment owners are non-Bengalis and vegetarians. But much before the Merlin Group advertisement came out and murmurs of such diktats outside some “non-Bengali” housing societies, Kolkata, the El Dorado of the Bengali intellectual, has had unofficial demarcations of Bengali and non-Bengali residential areas. It just so happens that a sizeable chunk of the city’s prime real estate like Alipore, New Alipore, and Ballygunge Circular Road has become primarily “non-Bengali areas”.
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Bengal for Bengalis and other myths
It is not just real estate and those hired to sell it that have brought the Bengali (insider) versus the non-Bengali (outsider) divide within Kolkata and outside to the fore. If the pro-Bengali advocacy group Bangla Pokkho is to be believed, it is Bengali culture as a whole that is at stake. The organisation was formed in 2018 to “focus on rights for Bengalis in the Republic of India based on Bengali nationalism (not to be confused with Bangladeshi nationalism)”.
Fronted by academic and activist Garga Chatterjee, the group claims to work against the “Hindustani cultural and linguistic imperialism and forced domination of Hindi–Urdu speakers in West Bengal”.
Grabbing headlines by picking on non-Bengalis in West Bengal who post “derogatory” comments on Bengalis and non-Bengali shopowners with signboards in Hindi, Bangla Pokkho has also put out more serious demands like 100 per cent reservation for residents of West Bengal in government jobs and inclusion of Bangla in examinations for railways, JEE, NEET etc. The group has claimed it has around three lakh supporters within the state and counting, and it is not the only one putting forth a Bengal-for-Bengalis narrative.
“Through their social media posts, Bangla Pokkho activists have painted their own picture of the ‘Hindi belt’ — where everyone consumes Gutkha, is uncultured and regressive, are all vegetarians and BJP voters. They have termed the ‘Hindi/Urdu belt’ as ‘cow belt’, ‘baby factory belt’, ‘gutkha belt’ and ‘female foeticide belt’, among others,” boomlive.in wrote in a report on the group on 5 January 2024.
But beyond Bangla Pokkho’s stated aim of freeing West Bengal from “Hindi imperialism”, the insider-outsider debate has taken a serious political turn. The ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) has long labelled its principal opposition in the state, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), as a Bohiragoto Party, a political formation from the Hindi belt that understands neither the sentiments nor sensibilities of Bengalis.
“Bangla Nijer Meyekei Chay (Bengal wants her own daughter)” became the battle cry for Mamata Banerjee during the West Bengal assembly elections 2021 as she took on the BJP’s Modi-Shah juggernaut and won a decisive victory.
But this debate had begun earlier. “Soon after the results of the Lok Sabha election (when the BJP had its best ever Lok Sabha tally from the state with 18 seats in 2019), West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said that those living in Bengal will have to learn to speak Bengali. Apparently taking a queue from her comment, state BJP president Dilip Ghosh alleged that Bangla Pokkho was serving the interests of the TMC,” Deccan Herald reported on 6 November 2019.
It is another matter that the TMC has fielded “non-Bengalis” like Kirti Azad, Yusuf Pathan, and Shatrughan Sinha in this Lok Sabha polls purportedly to counter the BJP and win over the non-Bengali voters in the state. And while Bhojpuri singer Pawan Singh had withdrawn his nomination from the Asansol Lok Sabha seat under a BJP ticket, after X was flooded with lyrics of his songs that were allegedly derogatory toward Bengali women, another popular Bhojpuri star and singer Khesari Lal Yadav has been campaigning for TMC candidates.
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Desperately searching for cosmopolitan Kolkata
It is ironic that Bengal, especially Kolkata, which has long prided itself on its cosmopolitan ethos, has descended to such othering in society and politics. But beyond the façade, bigotry has long been normalised in the state. With pejorative terms for people from almost every other state, Bengalis have derided the non-Bengali residing in Bengal for long. The Merlin advertisement, some would argue, is a comeuppance for Bengali bigotry.
The other issue that fuels the current Bohiragoto debate is the fact that 34 years of the Left and the militant trade unionism that followed led to the flight of industries from the state and, in turn, years of brain drain leading to Bengalis becoming Bohiragotos in other states. And a certain contempt for wealth creation became a generational burden for Bengali graduates who stayed back in the state. Over time, the Bengali got stereotyped as well-read, opinionated, and lethargic. Interestingly, much of the non-Bengali population that had made Bengal home negotiated with its turbulent and often industry-unfriendly politics to not just survive but also thrive here.
Nothing can illustrate this point more than the example of Shree Venkatesh Films, the biggest production and distribution company for Bengali films and OTT. It is owned by Shrikant Mohta and Mahendra Soni, two non-Bengalis. Even Bengali cinema today is powered by “outsiders”. Non-Bengalis have contributed more to the development of Bengal than Bengalis, former Bengal BJP chief Dilip Ghosh had said in December 2020, sparking a big controversy in the state. While the Bohiragoto debate makes for potent politics, the Bengali should ask themselves when and why they became a Bohiragoto for recruiters in their own state and if othering non-Bengalis will help their cause.
Views are personal.
(Edited by Humra Laeeq)