30 OUTLOOK 1 July 2019
COVER STORY
that came at the expense of an atrophy-
ing Left and Congress. And yes, the
TMC too increased its voteshare—to
43 per cent (2.47 crore) from 39 per
cent. But superimpose these figures on
the assembly map: of the 294 assembly
seats in Bengal, the BJP is ahead in
121, and in another 37 seats, they are
beh ind by less than 2,000 votes. That’s
within striking distance. BJP state
vice-president Jayprakash Majumdar,
an educated Bengali middle-class face
of the party, says: “It is now Mission
Bengal for us.”
The one thing common between the
Left and Mamata is cracking now.
Bengali society, which was boastful of
its secular-liberal credentials and abh-
orred politics based on Hindi, Hindutva
and communal preaching, is now glee-
fully talking the language of the BJP. On
social media, educated Beng ali
Hindus have finally found a vent to
pour out their long-bottled-up hatred
for the ‘other’, the Muslim community,
condemning the Left and Mamata in
the same breath for their avowedly (and
frequently tactical) secular politics. The
only state besides Punjab that under-
went the horrors of Partition on a mas-
sive scale, Bengal has never had politics
that articulated that pent-up anger—till
now. Bivas Chakraborty, a noted stage
personality, notes with regret, “The
edu cated middle-class Bengali society
has gone over to BJP.”T
HE field was fallow for a long time.
The Congress and the Communists
allowed no space for communal
politics, but turned a blind eye
to society. The Partition in 1947 had
created millions of Hindu refugees
who nursed a genuine grievance for
the loss of their homes. In the absence
of a cogent political explanation, that
had long turned into a grudge against
Muslims. Major communal riots in
1950, 1964 and 1992, and many minor
ones, give lie to the carefully built sec-
ular-liberal narrative cherished by the
Bengali ‘mainstream’. The truth is, after
the 1950 riots, Muslim ghettoisation
had started—in Calcutta and outside,
they started living in areas where they
felt more secure. Conversely, Bengali
Hindu middle-class localities started
shunning Muslims. Even today, it is
very difficult, well nigh impossible, for
an educated Muslim executive to geta house on rent in a Hindu locality
in Calcutta. Says Chakraborty, “Why
blame BJP alone? It’s true that they
openly preach communal hatred.
But we are also guilty of nurturing
communal feelings.”
The Left and Congress, in their hey-
day, would gloat about Bengal being
free of ‘that barbaric culture’, a favour-
ite term used by Jyoti Basu to denigrate
the BJP. The liberals would trot out the
names of the Bengal renaissance pan-
theon to insist their society was above
retrograde politics. Yet there was no
ser ious attempt to cleanse the poison
left by Partition. Ian Buruma has writ-
ten how Germany, unlike Japan, tried
to consciously grapple with the guilt of
the Holocaust. ‘Hindu’ Bengal, in deed
if not in word, was more Japan—despite
Muslims trying to defy the logic of ghet-
toisation, freely taking part in Durga
Puja, for instance. But there was no real
reciprocity, no regular social inter-course. Not all of it was fake. A Hindu
girl once topped exams studying from a
madrasa. Still, tokenism was easier
than actual assimilation for parties.
Pradip Bhattacharjee, a Congress
leader, recalls the shock of seeing reli-
gious identity taking primacy over po-
litical ideology in his party after the
Babri Masjid demolition.
The Sachar Committee report of 2006
should have been enough to bust the
myth of a happy, secular Bengal.
Muslims occupied the margins in edu-
cation, health and employment. The
Left regime was in denial, and got its
comeuppance when Muslims—27 per
cent of Bengal’s population—turned
their back on them. When Mamata
rode to power in 2011 through anti-Left
peasant movements in Singur-
Nandigram, Muslim peasants were a
significant part of that. Soon
after, Mamata announced a committee
to be headed by Justice Sachar to study
the conditions of Muslims in Bengal.
Her rule saw ‘secular’ politics touching
its shallow, exhibitionist heights—huge
posters of her offering namaaz, head
covered, adorned ‘Muslim’ localities,
and that other thing—stipends for
imams and muezzins, the BJP’s favour-
ite bugbear. But, as Kamaruzzaman,
president, All Bengal Muslim Youth
Federation, points out, nothing hap-
pened on the Sachar Committee
front. “Instead, within a few months
after coming to power, Mamata decl-
ared she had completed 90 per cent ofEducated Bengali
Hindus now pour out
their bottled-up hatred
for the ‘other’—Muslims.
They condemn both the
Left and Mamata for
their secular politics.BJP workers confront TMC cadres
after the LS win on May 23 in CalcuttaGETTY IMAGES