New Delhi: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee Monday announced the launch of a movement to safeguard Bengali language from the “severe assault it is facing,” at the Trinamool Congress’s annual Martyrs’ Day rally—signaling an aggressive political campaign against the BJP centred around cultural pride in the run-up to the 2026 state elections.
If TMC’s campaign around this theme crystallises, it will effectively reprise its 2021 Assembly poll strategy, which had a similar focus, branding BJP as a party of “outsiders”, alien to Bengali identity and ethos. An influential section of the Bengali intelligentsia had rallied behind Banerjee at the time, giving a significant boost to TMC’s narrative.
Speaking in her characteristic combative style, Banerjee said TMC will lead a language movement in West Bengal from 27 July against BJP’s “linguistic terrorism” and the “attack on Bengalis” across states. The TMC chief underscored that she was not against other Indian languages, but was not ready to tolerate any insult of her mother tongue.
“We love Hindi, Gujarati, Marathi, Rajasthani, every language. But why are you attacking Bengali? Bengal is the land of freedom fighters and renaissance. The soil of Bengal is impregnable. I appeal to people to destroy the double engine, bring down the BJP in Delhi. We will take this fight to Delhi,” Banerjee said. Adding, “After winning the 2026 election, our focus will shift to defeating the BJP in Delhi. You will not be able to stop us using your agencies. I am laying the foundation stone for that imminent change in Delhi today.”
Speaking shortly before the chief minister, her nephew and TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee asserted that TMC will force BJP to raise the “Jai Bangla” slogan in 2026, “just like we compelled BJP to chant Jai Maa Kali and Jai Maa Durga instead of Jai Shree Ram”.
At the annual rally, which commemorates the deaths of 13 people in police firing in Kolkata in 1993, when the state was under Left rule, Mamata also invoked the Hindu goddess, revered in West Bengal, in an attempt to puncture BJP’s attempts to brand her as pro-Muslim.
“Maa Durga is our national treasure. Just like I constructed the (Digha) Jagannath Dham, I will construct a Durga Aangan,” she said, before taunting the Modi government on the sudden halt of Operation Sindoor.
“You are being controlled by the US President. Why could you not capture Pakistan-occupied Kashmir? What kind of a Hindu are you? You are neither Hindu, Muslim, Jain or Christian. Have you forgotten how the US President had sent Gujaratis back to India in chains? There was no one from Bengal to have been sent back because talented Bengalis are settled there,” the chief minister said.
Beginning 27 July, said Banerjee, every weekend meetings and marches will be held across West Bengal to highlight concerns over attacks on Bengalis and their language.
She said states cannot be held responsible for infiltration as safeguarding the country’s borders is the job of the Union government. “You go and manage Pahalgam first. You allow infiltrators to enter India. We don’t manage the borders.”
The TMC supremo also lashed out at Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma over the serving of a notice to an individual belonging to the Rajbongshi community in West Bengal’s Cooch Behar suspecting his Indian nationality by the Foreigners Tribunal in Assam.
Assam government claims it has withdrawn all such proceedings against members of the Rajbongshi community. “Stop interfering in our affairs. If you don’t, I challenge you (Sarma), I want to see how many of us you can detain and put in your jails. I am ready to die but not going to tolerate insults of Bengali or any other language,” Banerjee said.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)