Kolkata, Dec 30: Setting the tone for the high-stakes West Bengal assembly polls, Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday launched a broadside against Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, accusing her government of “dangerously altering” the state’s demography by abetting the infiltration of Bangladeshis for electoral gains, widespread corruption, and failing to ensure women’s safety.
With the polls for the 294-member state assembly less than six months away, Shah also asserted that the BJP will restore the state’s lost glory. “After April 15, 2026, when a BJP government is formed in Bengal, the party under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi will begin the revival of the state’s pride, culture, and renaissance,” he said at a press conference here.
Shah, considered the principal poll strategist of the BJP, arrived here last night on a three-day visit to assess the party’s organisational preparedness for the upcoming West Bengal assembly elections in 2026.
The coming months ahead of the assembly polls are “crucial” for the state, he said, and added that West Bengal has witnessed “fear, corruption, and misgovernance” under 15 years of the Trinamool Congress.
Asserting that infiltration has created a sense of insecurity and anxiety among the people in the state, the Union Home Minister said the issue of “driving infiltrators out of the country” would be his party’s key poll issue.
Announcing that a “strong and robust national grid” would be set up to end infiltration in Bengal, Shah said, “Insaan chhod dijiye, parinda bhi par nahin maar paye, is prakar ki mazboot grid ki rachana hum karenge (forget humans, even birds won’t be able to breach the grid we intend to build).” “Na keval ghoospet rokenge, saare ghoospetiyon ko chun chun ke Bharat ke bahar nikalne ka kaam bhi BJP ki Bangal sarkar karegi (The BJP-led government in Bengal will not only stop the infiltrators, but it will also identify each of them and drive them out of the country),” he added.
He also accused the West Bengal government of not providing the required land to complete the fencing of the India-Bangladesh border.
“Mamata Banerjee blames the BSF for not stopping infiltration. I am asking her from this public platform, which is the only state government bordering Bangladesh that doesn’t provide land to erect border fences. It is your government that doesn’t provide land and that is why the task of border fencing doesn’t get completed,” he said.
Shah said stopping infiltration at the Bengal border is now a “national security issue” and questioned Banerjee on why the problem is more acute in Bengal than in BJP-ruled Assam, Tripura, or in the country’s western states like Rajasthan and Gujarat, besides Punjab and Kashmir.
He alleged that Bengal has turned into a “safe haven for infiltrators” since the “Mamata Banerjee police don’t arrest or lodge cases against them” after they make it to the rural backyards after crossing borders in geographically difficult terrains.
“Why does it happen only in Bengal? That’s because infiltration happens here under your direct monitoring and patronage, resulting in slow but steady change of the state’s demography to strengthen your vote bank,” he said.
Shah said that people of the state were “aware and have started uniting against” infiltration, and exuded confidence that the BJP will form a government in West Bengal with a “two-thirds majority”.
Highlighting BJP’s “electoral growth in Bengal,” Shah said its Lok Sabha seats rose from 2 in 2014 to 18 in 2019, and Assembly seats from three to 77 in five years in 2021, while the Congress and Left dipped to zero.
He also noted that the BJP won 12 seats and 39% vote share in 2024, predicting a majority government in 2026. “The people of Bengal have firmly resolved to replace the environment of fear, corruption, misgovernance, and infiltration by reestablishment of its heritage, development, and uplifting of the poor, which can only be brought about by a strong and focused BJP government,” he said. (PTI)
