From Subtle To Brazen — How Bengal BJP 2.0 Is Planning Its Narrative On Waqf Protests – News18

Last Updated:April 14, 2025, 11:29 IST

The BJP aims for Hindu polarisation in West Bengal, citing the Bangladesh situation where the Hindu minority suffered violence, while the TMC worries that the stand may cost it in the 2026 elections

BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari takes part in a procession on the occasion of Hanuman Jayanti in Kolkata. (PTI)

Political battle lines are drawn once again in West Bengal where anti-Waqf protests snowballed into communal violence, killing three, and setting the tone for the assembly election the next year.

Amid the growing unrest, which forced the Calcutta High Court to ask the state to seek central forces with immediate effect, the BJP has pointed to lack of sensitivity on the part of the Trinamool Congress (TMC), citing instances of MP Yusuf Pathan talking about his ‘chai’ on Instagram and his colleague Derek O’ Brien taking to Facebook to showcase his ‘Sunday lunch’ with catfish, spinach, dal and rice.

Given the unrest, the BJP is espousing the cause of the Hindus who constitute about 70 per cent of the population. It is also portraying the ruling TMC as siding with the minorities of the state who have been a solid support system for Mamata Banerjee’s party since 2011.

However, more than three BJP leaders News18 spoke to, say there lies a twist in the tale.

Polarisation has suited both the BJP and the TMC in the past, making it a two-way contest and leaving the Congress and CPI(M) redundant. It helped BJP with 18 Lok Sabha seats in 2019 but the numbers dwindled in the 2021 assembly election where data suggests the saffron party trailed in eight districts such as Nadia, Hooghly and West Midnapore where over 60 per cent of the population is Hindu. So, what is BJP’s strategy to consolidate Hindu votes this time and how is it any different?

“In 2019, there was a subtle Hindutva push in a state where Hindus were forced to see how students were being killed for demanding teachers in classes (Daribhit, 2018) or roadblocks were created at many places when they wanted to hold Saraswati Puja in schools (Tehatta, 2017). As a result, we saw overwhelming public participation in Ram Navami processions,” said a BJP leader in West Bengal, requesting anonymity. However, the leader adds, their Hindutva push failed in 2021 when TMC’s Bengali vs Outsider narrative triumphed. “This time, it is not the BJP that is pushing anything. We are holding a mirror to Hindu society, making them realise it’s an existential crisis for the community. If they (Muslims) can hold the state to ransom and kill you for nothing, it should ring alarm bells. We are simply showing them the reality. This is not an election strategy,” he adds.

The messaging too has been brazen, unlike in the past. Take the instance of BJP’s national spokesperson Pradeep Bhandari who took to X to call the violence pre-planned and alleged “it’s designed to send a chilling political message to the Hindus of Bengal”. Bhandari added: “Demography is liberal democracy’s destiny!”

The leader was referring to Murshidabad, Malda and Uttar Dinajpur — three districts where Muslims form the majority of the population. Murshidabad district, which has been witness to massive communal flare-ups, has 66.27 per cent Muslims, according to the 2011 census. The Hindu community here is just 33.21 per cent of the population. Even four years ago, one could not have imagined the BJP sending out such obvious messaging.

About 178 kilometres from Murshidabad’s Jangipur, which witnessed tense communal violence, former Bengal BJP president Dilip Ghosh took part in a Hanuman Jayanti celebration on Sunday. The proverbial ‘Hindu-Muslim Bhai Bhai’ slogan has been tweaked here by Ghosh who asked for “Hindu Hindu Bhai Bhai”. With a more colloquial version of PM Narendra Modi’s “Ek hain toh safe hain” slogan, Ghosh talked about how Kirtan groups and the Matua community (a strong BJP vote bank) were among the many branches that came together for the event.

West Bengal’s leader of opposition Suvendu Adhikari was probably the most brazen of the lot when he raised the issue of the two Hindu victims killed in the communal violence.

“Hara Gobinda Das and Chandan Das were at their home. What was their fault? Their fault was they were Hindus. The way they were attacked with a chopper…Have you guys seen the face of Hara Gobinda Das? Have you seen the photo?… A ‘Jihadi’ used the name of Modi-ji and Amit Shah-ji day before yesterday [Hanuman Jayanti] and said: ‘This is nothing. Our festival is coming. We will slaughter Hindus’,” claimed Adhikari.

The three people reported dead in the West Bengal violence in Murshidabad on April 12 were Hara Gobinda Das, Chandan Das, and Izaz Ahmed Sheikh. While the father-son duo was hacked to death by a mob on Saturday, 17-year-old Sheikh succumbed to bullet wounds after police opened fire in Suti on Friday.

For the Bengal BJP, there seems to be nothing that is taboo as far as discourse is concerned — Naming religion, magnifying Hindu victimhood or creating a fear psychosis by talking about demographic shift. The age of subtleties and nuanced references is over for the party. It now communicates directly with 70.54 per cent of Bengal’s population, suggesting their only way out is a BJP government in 2026.

Bengal BJP MLA and frontrunner for the state president’s post, Agnimitra Paul, understands this shift in the party’s strategy for Bengal. Hence, her messaging too has become in sync with BJP’s polarisation shift 2.0. “They have only one target — Hindu-less West Bengal. Our chief minister is dancing to the tunes of Bangladeshi radicals who are killing Hindus there. This is a big agenda to unify Bangladesh and West Bengal to form an Islamic state. This is the politics of Mamata Banerjee for her vote bank. She should be arrested,” alleged Paul. However, she did not furnish any evidence to back her claim.

Unlike during the post-poll violence after the 2021 loss, when many BJP cadres felt deserted, the saffron party is making sure the victims are heard and seen this time. Adhikari has flashed his personal email ID to liaison between NGOs and affected Hindus so that relief material reaches them as soon as possible.

However, a faux pas by its state unit has embarrassed the party, too. West Bengal Police fact-checked how violence from other states and previous years is being passed off as incidents from West Bengal, forcing Bengal BJP chief Susanta Majumder to delete his tweet.

TMC latched on to the faux pas, with its Rajya Sabha MP Susmita Dev calling it a “campaign of disinformation”. “This is riot engineering, not politics,” she claims. TMC spokesperson Riju Dutta alleges, “They (BJP) have perfected the art of orchestrating riots, and they’re putting that expertise to use in Bengal.”

But beyond the name-calling, even TMC leadership is finding it hard to grasp this ‘new BJP’ in Bengal which has launched a no-holds-barred attack on the ruling party and its biggest face. From Sukanta Majumder’s “last warning to Mamata Banerjee” to Arjun Singh’s “will bring Hindus from Bihar, UP, Jharkhand and will empty Murshidabad, Malda in one day” — all are part of this ‘new BJP’ syndrome which wants to be seen as the saviour of Hindus.

The BJP aims for Hindu polarisation in West Bengal, citing the Bangladesh situation where the Hindu minority suffered violence. The BJP has tried the trick in earlier elections too but not all Hindus vote for the party, while the Muslims gravitate towards the TMC. This time, the perception due to the Bangladesh violence could help the BJP in West Bengal and TMC knows this may cost it.