Kolkata: A day after Election Commission of India (ECI) announced special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in 12 states and Union Territories, including West Bengal, a tragic death triggered a political slugfest between the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) and BJP.
A 57-year-old man by the name of Pradeep Kar allegedly died by suicide “due to fear of NRC”.
According to Barrackpore Police Commissioner Muralidhar Sharma, Kar was found hanging at his home in North 24 Parganas district on Tuesday morning.
The senior cop informed that Kar had left a suicide note which stated he was depressed about NRC and was under severe stress following the announcement of SIR from November 4.
No sooner had the news surfaced than chief minister Mamata Banerjee accused the BJP of indulging in politics of fear and division. The saffron party hit back, saying the West Bengal CM was “deliberately spreading panic” among people for political gain.
Mamata took to social media to condemn the BJP’s “politics of fear and division,” and went on to say that the party’s campaign around the NRC had created panic among people.
“It shakes me to the very core to imagine how, for years, BJP has tormented innocent citizens with the threat of NRC, spreading lies, stoking panic and weaponising insecurity for votes,” Mamata wrote on X.
Accusing the BJP of turning “constitutional democracy into a theatre of fear”, the chief minister claimed that the “tragic death” was the result of “venomous propaganda.”
Not for the first time, Mamata asserted that her government will not allow the NRC to be implemented in the state.
“Those who sit in Delhi and preach nationalism have pushed ordinary Indians to such despair that they are dying in their own land, fearing they will be declared ‘foreigners’,” she said.
Malviya countered Mamata by saying that there was no nationwide NRC in the country and accused Trinamool Congress of indulging in fearmongering and making lies for political gain. However, the implementation of SIR will “mark the beginning of her political downfall,” Malviya claimed.
Demanding an investigation into Kar’s death, Malviya wrote on X: “The tragic death of Pradeep Kar must be investigated thoroughly — the cause of suicide can and must be determined only by the law and investigating agencies, not through political rhetoric. Let’s also get the facts right — there is no NRC anywhere in the country. Mamata Banerjee is lying and deliberately spreading panic to stoke fear among people for political gain.”
“Mamata Banerjee knows that a proper SIR will expose the rot in her administration and mark the beginning of her political downfall. The SIR will also ensure that illegal infiltrators, who double up as TMC’s votebank, are identified and deleted from the voter list. That’s why she’s resorting to lies and theatrics once again.”
NRC is a government register meant to identify Indian citizens and detect illegal immigrants.
BJP-led Central government has said time and again it plans to implement the NRC nationwide, but that is yet to materialise.
NRC has only been implemented in Assam, which is governed by BJP.
