BJP leader: Sans NRC, West Bengal will become Bangladesh 2

A senior leader of Indian ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has said that the state of West Bengal will turn into another Bangladesh in absence of the National Register of Citizens (NRC).

“The NRC is required. Whatever Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister (CM) Yogi Adityanath and Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sharma are doing is right and is required, lest the area becomes Bangladesh-2,” Suvendu Adhikari told a religious festival in Bongaon of North 24 Parganas on Friday, reports News18. 

The current Leader of the Opposition in the West Bengal Legislative Assembly, Suvendu went on saying in Hindi: “Samajhdaro ke liye ishara kafi hai (people can take a cue from my statement).”

The NRC is a register of all Indian citizens whose creation is mandated by the 2003 amendment of the Citizenship Act, 1955. Its purpose is to document all the legal citizens of India so that “the illegal immigrants can be identified and deported.”

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Meanwhile, senior BJP leader and former Governor of Tripura Tathagata Roy supporting Suvendu’s claim on Friday took to Twitter and said that Suvendu’s claim is ‘100% correct’, according to The Free Press Journal.

“Suvendu has raised question in favour of NRC and Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) in West Bengal which is very much needed. We need to learn lessons from Yogi Adityanath and Hemanta Biswa Sarma and implement them in West Bengal or else West Bengal will become Bangladesh 2. Suvendu’s claim is 100% correct,” wrote Tathagata in Bengali.

Notably, not just Suvendu, several BJP leaders including BJP Bongaon MP Shantanu Thakur has time-and-again urged the central government to implement CAA in Bengal, but citing pandemic Home Minister Amit Shah during his poll campaign said after the pandemic is curbed then the BJP government will implement CAA in West Bengal.

Also Read - Amit Shah: Bangladeshi immigrants are termites

The area where Adhikari gave his speech is dominated by the Matua community and his statement are likely to trigger political reactions from the opposition parties.

More than 60 assembly seats in West Bengal have a strong Matua influence.

It is pertinent to mention that a large section of Matuas in Bongaon had defected to BJP from Trinamool Congress (TMC) hoping for CAA and NRC.

TMC spokesperson and state general secretary Kunal Ghosh slammed both Suvendu and Tathagata over NRC issue.

Also Read - West Bengal BJP chief vows to ‘undivided’ India

“In Assam, by creating detention camp several people were became homeless and they are away from their relatives. A person is known by the company he keeps. BJP is communal party and is unnecessary trying to create tension,” mentioned Kunal.

What are CAA and NRC?

The CAA passed by the Indian parliament on December 11, 2019, aims to fast-track citizenship for persecuted Hindus, Parsis, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains and Christians who arrived in India before December 31, 2014, from Muslim-majority Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan.

The NRC is the long-delayed culmination of the anti-foreigners movement in Assam which led to the signing of the Assam Accord in 1985. Under the accord, those who entered Assam after March 24, 1971, would be declared foreigners and be deported. 

Protests and violence had erupted across India since the enactment of the CAA and declarations of conducting NRC.