'Insulting and unconstitutional': Mamata protests after Delhi Police calls Bangla a 'language of Bangladesh'

Kolkata: A letter from the Delhi Police referring to Bangla as a "language of Bangladesh" added new momentum to the Trinamool Congress’s protest against the “linguistic terror” allegedly unleashed by the BJP or BJP-led governments, in other states, on the migrant workers from West Bengal.

“Scandalous, insulting, anti-national, unconstitutional!!,” TMC supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister, Mamata Banerjee wrote on X, posting a letter from the Delhi Police to the Banga Bhavan in the National Capital Territory.

The letter was written by the Station House Officer of the Lodhi Colony Police Station in the South District of Delhi, requesting the Banga Bhavan, an institution of the Government of West Bengal, to arrange for the translation of the texts on the documents recovered from eight persons, arrested in the National Capital Territory and strongly suspected to be Bangladeshis residing illegally in India.  

“The identification documents contain texts written in Bangladeshi and are needed to be translated to Hindi and English. Now, for the investigation to proceed further, it is requested that an official translator/interpreter proficient in Bangladeshi national language may kindly be provided for the aforesaid purpose,” Amit Dutt, the investigating officer of the Lodi Colony Police Station in Delhi, wrote to the officer-in-charge of Banga Bhavan in the National Capital Territory.

“See now how Delhi police, under the direct control of the Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India, is describing Bengali as ‘Bangladeshi’ language!” Mamata posted on X.

“Bengali, our mother tongue, the language of Rabindranath Tagore and Swami Vivekananda, the language in which our National Anthem and the National Song (the latter by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay) are written, the language in which crores of Indians speak and write, the language which is sanctified and recognised by the Constitution of India, is now described as a Bangladeshi language," her post read further.

The TMC over the past few weeks stepped up its attacks on the governments of the BJP-ruled states for the detention of migrant workers from West Bengal by police and, in some cases, even deportation to Bangladesh, often allegedly disregarding their claim of being genuine citizens of India.

Mamata and other TMC leaders accused the BJP-led governments in Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Gujarat and Delhi of harassing migrant workers from her state only because they spoke in their mother language, Bangla.

Bangla (Bengali) is not only the national language of Bangladesh, but also the language of the majority of people in West Bengal.

“This insults all Bengali-speaking people of India. They cannot use this kind of language, which degrades and debases us all, “ said Mamata, urging immediate, strongest possible protests from all against the anti-Bengali Government of India, who are using such anti-Constitutional language to insult and humiliate the Bengali-speaking people of India.

Mamata on July 28 led her Trinamool Congress to launch the second “Bhasha Andolan” (language movement) from the land of Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore to protest the “linguistic terror” she accused the BJP of unleashing on the Bengali-speaking