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Bengal: All I wanna say is that they don’t really care about us

Today it’s the Hindu-Muslim question. In the 1980s, it was CPM’s goons killing Congress’s workers. India did not care even when Mamata Banerjee was near-fatally attacked

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Surajit Dasgupta
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Bengal: All I wanna say is that they don’t really care about us

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As a Bengali Indian Hindu, I am no less troubled by the amusement of the rest of India at the plight of my community in West Bengal than I am with the plight itself. Yet another communal clash (read “Muslim-kills-Hindu” story) erupts in the state. The larger Hindu community, as much as the central leadership of the BJP, feel their obligation has been addressed by tweeting about it — just as they have been making ‘moving’ social media posts about hanging corpses and raped women in the state for the past so many years!

 

The jury is still out on whether the Waqf Amendment Bill, 2025, has pleased or angered Indian Muslims, as no state other than the one ruled by the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress has reported widespread Muslim attacks on Hindus (and a few instances of Hindu resistance or retaliation). The violence escalated between April 8 and 12. Three people have lost their lives while the police have arrested about 150 suspected miscreants.

What happened in Murshidabad

Murshidabad, the district that was the capital of its last Muslim ruler, Siraj ul Daulah, has recently experienced several communal clashes, this year purportedly triggered by protests against the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025. These events, starting around April 8, have led to violence, casualties and a strong response from both state and central authorities.

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee announced that the Waqf (Amendment) Act would not be implemented in the state, appealing for peace and accusing political parties of exploiting religious sentiments. Opposition leader Suvendu Adhikari (BJP) criticised the state government, alleging over 400 Hindus were driven out due to the violence. The Trinamool Congress claimed a larger conspiracy involving central agencies, highlighting the political controversy surrounding the clashes.

  • April 8: Initial protests started in Murshidabad, with demonstrations in Jangipur, Suti, and Samserganj. These protests were largely peaceful but set the stage for later violence.
  • April 11: The situation escalated, with reports of stone pelting, arson, and vandalism. Railway services were disrupted due to protesters squatting on tracks in Suti and Samserganj. Police responded by firing four rounds, injuring several, including 18 police personnel. The vandalism included attacks on railway property in Azimgarh and vehicles set on fire near the Sajur crossing.
  • April 12: The violence reached a peak, resulting in three deaths:
    • Hargobind Das (74) and his son Chandan Das (40) were hacked to death by a mob in Dhulian, Shamsherganj. Their family alleged that miscreants looted their house before the attack.
    • Izaz Ahmed Sheikh (17), injured by police firing on April 11 in Suti, succumbed to his injuries on April 12.
    • Two other civilians were injured in the crossfire and admitted to hospitals.
    • Arrests: Overnight on April 11-12, over 118 people were arrested, with the total exceeding 150 by April 13. Additional arrests were made for violence on April 8, with over 22 individuals detained.
      Police fired four rounds during clashes on April 11, as reported by ADG Jawed Shamim, who also noted rumour-spreading and mob attacks on police and railway property.

DGP Rajeev Kumar, whom the state government had shielded from getting arrested by the CBI in 2019, held a press conference, emphasising strong action against miscreants and stating the situation was tense but monitored closely.

Internet services were suspended in parts of Murshidabad to prevent further escalation, a measure also seen in earlier November 2024 clashes.

The situation remained tense but under control, with central forces deployed following Calcutta High Court orders. The Calcutta High Court intervened on April 12, ordering the deployment of central armed police forces (CAPF) in violence-affected areas. Six BSF companies were deployed, with additional forces requested by the state government. Union Home Secretary Govind Mohan held a video conference with state officials, assuring all possible assistance, including additional manpower if necessary.

Residents fled to neighbouring Malda by boat for safety, highlighting the severity of the unrest.

As of April 14, a tense calm prevails, with deserted streegang rapeseavy presence of paramilitary forces, including BSF and CRPF, ensuring stability. People who had fled are gradually returning home, and the situation is reported as under control by police officials.

In the larger picture, Murshidabad, with a Muslim population of 66.28% as per the 2011 census, has a history of communal tensions, often exacerbated by political and religious factors. The district’s proximity to the Bangladesh border and its demographic composition make it sensitive to such conflicts.

Flashpoint Bengal

The glaring thing about the situation in the state is not only the Trinamool Congress’s complicity, connivance or appeasement of the assailants but also the apathy of the union government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the strange indiffgang rapeshe Supreme Court, known to get worked up whenever an incident of attack on Muslims is reported from anywhere in the country.

At least 65 cases of inter-religious strife occurred in the state from 2017 to 2024, with 3 major incidents in Murshidabad in 2024 and 1 notable case in Sandeshkhali in 2024.

Baduria, 2017

The 2017 Baduria riots in the North 24 Parganas, for example, were triggered by a social media post on July 2, 2017, by a 17-year-old student, sharing an image of Muhammad and the Kaa’ba, deemed offensive, which went viral and led to communal tensions.

An RSS worker was killed, whereas 25 total injuries were reported, including 20 policemen.

The state government deployed paramilitary forces, including four companies of the Border Security Force (BSF), to assist the state police in containing the situation. Chief Minister Banerjee accused the Governor of political interference, indicating state-level political tensions. Her government ordered a judicial inquiry into the “fake news propaganda” and the causes of the Baduria incident, aiming to address the role of social media in escalating violence.

The Centre stayed aloof while BJP leaders Nupur Sharma and Tarun Sengupta were arrested for “spreading fake news”.

Asansol, 2018

Communal clashes erupted during the Ram Navami processions in March 2018, with tensions between Trinamool Congress led by local Muslim leaders and BJP supporters led by local Hindu leaders. A total of five deaths were reported.

The state government suspended internet services, imposed Section 144, and arrested rioters. The judiciary took no action. The Modi government sought a report from the state government.

Bhatpara, 2018-2021

These communal and political clashes were part of broader unrest. The state government formed ‘peace centres’ and deployed police, while no specific judicial actions were noted, and the Modi government chose to look the other way.

Telinipara, 2020

This was triggered by a dispute during the Covid lockdown in May 2020, leading to communal riots.

Once again, the Banerjee government established a few so-called peace centres and deployed police while both the judiciary and the union government did not get involved.

Post-poll violence across the state, 2021

Other than humiliating the turncoats from the Trinamool Congress who had moved to the BJP before the election by tonsuring their heads and making them ride donkeys in a peculiar mediaeval-style political retribution, Muslim supporters of the Trinamool Congress attacked Hindu supporters of the BJP, killing six BJP workers. With the national party’s central leadership looking away, the Hindus who did not flee retaliated, killing four Trinamool Congress workers and one Indian Secular Front (ISF) worker.

The state government gave a standard law and order response, with Chief Minister Banerjee appealing for peace.

This time, while the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) got involved, it rejected 21 cases of molestation and rape due to lack of evidence and investigated 39 cases of rape and molestation, 52 cases of murder or unnatural death, and submitted 10 charge sheets for murders/unnatural deaths.

The Union Ministry of Home Affairs sought a detailed report from the state government on the violence, and the Governor summoned state officials, indicating central oversight.

Birbhum, 2022

Here, the violence was triggered by the murder of Bhadu Sheikh, a Trinamool Congress panchayat leader, on March 21, 2022, who was attacked with a homemade bomb. In retaliation, a group set fire to several houses in Bogtui village, leading to deaths. This was primarily political, with both assailants and victims being Muslims, and not strictly inter-religious. 

Ten deaths were reported, all from the family of Lalan Sheikh, a rival of Bhadu Sheikh, including six women and two children. It was a law-and-order situation, nevertheless, an account on which the Banerjee government repeatedly fails.

The state government formed a Special Investigation Team (SIT) led by ADG CID Gyanwant Singh to investigate, and arrested 23 people, including members of both factions involved.

The Calcutta High Court ordered a CBI investigation into the violence, directing the SIT to hand over case papers and arrested persons to the central agency.

The central government registered no direct involvement, but the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) took suo motu cognisance of the incident.

Local elections, 2023

Violence erupted during the panchayat elections on July 8, 2023, involving workers from Trinamool Congress, BJP, Congress, and CPI(M), with clashes reported across the state, including stone-pelting and arson.

Unconfirmed casualties were largely Hindus. At least 11 deaths were reported across the state, with dozens more injured, but a specific religious breakdown could not be made.

The state government deployed central armed police forces to manage the situation, with police presence increased in affected areas.

No specific judicial action was noted beyond standard election-related monitoring.

The Election Commission monitored the situation, with no additional central government actions noted.

Multiple incidents in Murshidabad, 2024

On April 17, 2024, stones were pelted on a Ram Navami procession in the Rejinagar area of Murshidabad, with a blast reported near the procession, escalating tensions. A woman was injured in the skirmish.

Police detained persons involved in the violence, with no further details on additional measures. No specific judicial action was seen. No involvement of the union government was noted.

On November 17, 2024, during Kartik Puja celebrations, an alleged sacrilegious comment written with bulbs on an electrical display board led to clashes between Hindu and Muslim groups in Beldanga town, Murshidabad.

At least 50 people were injured from both communities; no deaths were reported, with four Beldanga residents, including a woman, admitted to Berhampore Medical College and Hospital, and one Rapid Action Force personnel injured.

The state government suspended internet services across Murshidabad district until November 19, 2024. Deployed a huge police contingent, including the rapid action force, brought back all officers who served in the Beldanga zone temporarily, and made 17 arrests.

No specific judicial actions were noticed, as the central government stayed apathetic too.

Sandeshkhali, 2024

The Sandeshkhali incident in 2024 can be considered for inclusion in the list of inter-religious strife in the state due to its communal undertones, as the accused, Sheikh Shahjahan (a Muslim), and his aides were alleged to have targeted primarily Hindu women for sexual assault and land grabbing.

West Bengal | A storm in Sandeshkhali

However, the incident is complex, blending political, economic, and communal elements, and some analyses argue it was more class-based oppression than purely communal violence — especially because the media regarded one of the accomplices of Shahjahan, Uttam Sardar, as a Hindu, ignoring the fact that he was a Bangladeshi infiltrator, Noor Alam.

A long record of India neglecting this state.

Keeping the Hindu-Muslim question aside, the apathy of the rest of India to the state is nothing new. Under the Indira and Rajiv Gandhi governments, local Congress workers, including today’s chief minister, constantly cried for help while the prime ministers of the 1980s could not care less.

At least twice, Banerjee was near-lethally attacked by henchmen of the CPM. No national newspaper covered the incidents.

This columnist was a witness to one of the hundreds of political murders that took place in the 34 years of CPM rule. Even gang-rapes of women, like the infamous incident of Bantala in 1990, where a UNICEF officer from Delhi was among the victims, did not stir the nation.

Frustrated, Banerjee broke away from her parent party, forming the Trinamool Congress in 1998. It would still take 13 more years for her to claim power at the Writers’ Building (the CMO is now in Nabanna).

To the rest of India around that time, the state was a land of communists whose ideology might have made them uncomfortable, but these bhadraloks, they assumed, were incapable of committing heinous crimes. To Bengalis themselves, Banerjee's actions were too loud and her speech too uncouth for their refined taste. Nobody in the state gave her a chance till the time Jyoti Basu was around.

If there is anything good the BJP has done for the state, it is its entry about a decade ago with intent. While it had been around since the Ram Janmabhoomi movement of the early 1990s, Bengalis considered the self-styled saffron party no more than a Burrabazar-centric party of Marwaris. It was when the BJP made up its mind to go all-out in the state assembly election contests in 2016 that the Delhi-NCR-centric media and their consumers across the country got interested, even as much of the concern is contemptible with ridiculous dismissals of the Bengali plight because a Bengali, the rest of India believes, is perforce a communist.

Given that the Hindu man’s community consciousness has heightened in the period coinciding with the Modi rule, people are now more agitated about the violence. Muslims of the state were on the other side under Basu and Buddhadeb Bhattacharya too, but Banerjee does not, by any stretch, know the statecraft of the suave communists who could pass off murder as “people’s revolution”. Barring rare exceptions, violence in the state back then did not mean Muslims hitting Hindus.

What changed between Basu and Banerjee

Somewhere around the Nandigram agitation, three changes happened in the state. One, Bhattacharjee exhorted the people of the state to turn industrious, which militated against the core of communist exhortation that industrialists were evil. This caused a rebellion in the ten-ruling party. Two, as the regime shook, the political henchmen realised their masters’ days at the helm were numbered. There was an exodus of goons from the CPM to the Trinamool Congress in this period. Last but not least, Banerjee realised that the two factors above were not sufficient for her to snatch power. Muslim support was paramount. In a state of desperation, she unleashed the force that was on a tight leash of the communists.

Now, she has no option. No matter how often and how brutally Hindus are attacked, Banerjee cannot afford to antagonise Muslims. She knows, of course, that the allegations of the BJP are right, as she used to mouth the same lines as an MP supporting the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government between 1998 and 2004 when she made similar accusations like fake voters’ identity cards and artificial swelling of the Muslim demography in the state against the CPM.

Leading a party where her workers sometimes expose colleagues who, they believe, have got a greater share of the institutional loot, Banerjee cannot rely on anybody but Muslims, who appear to have taken a sacred vow across India to support any local party that is the most formidable rival of the BJP.

No wonder, some Muslims in the state claim now that Chief Minister Banerjee does not protect them; rather, she is at their mercy.

Meanwhile, a victim of Emergency, the BJP, took a tacit pledge in the 1970s that in the distant future, when they would be in power, they would never invoke Section 356. In a state where voters are not allowed to reach CRPF-guarded booths, in a province where panchayat election candidates are slaughtered at the threshold of the sub-divisional magistrate’s office, in a place where the local police hold CBI’s officers hostage, examples of a total collapse of the constitution are many. But President’s Rule will never be imposed on the state, as the BJP also fears Banerjee would end up with massive public sympathy from it.

The people of Bengal in general and Hindus of the state in particular are condemned to fend for themselves until the party that has no tall leader except the chief minister disintegrates after her.

West Bengal Mamata Banerjee Trinamool Congress BJP Hindu Muslim