Union home minister Amit Shah on Wednesday said Bengal under the Trinamool Congress government was all about “Mullah, Madrasa and Mafia”.

The comments, clearly aimed at polarising voters in Bengal, came barely 24 hours after Prime Minister Narendra Modi claimed in Varanasi after filing his nomination that he would leave public life “the day he starts doing Hindu-Muslim”.

Shah told an election rally in Hooghly’s Mashat, which comes under the Serampore Lok Sabha constituency: “Mamata didi had come to power with the slogan of Ma-Mati-Manush. But the Ma-Mati-Manush slogan has now vanished and a slogan of Mullah-Madrasa-Mafia has taken shape in Bengal.”

Shah had made similar statements at earlier campaign rallies while accusing the Mamata Banerjee government of playing “appeasement politics”, but his comments on Wednesday drew attention for two reasons.

First, it came within 24 hours of Modi’s pledge in Varanasi where he decried religion-based politics in unambiguous terms.

Second, the context in which Shah made the comment during his 25-minute address that was replete with the polarisation agenda.

The Union home minister asked the crowd whether the Bengal government was doing the right thing by giving honorarium to imams and muezzins from the state exchequer even after the high court had ruled against it.

“Is it right to give honorarium to imams and the Mullahs (a possible reference to muezzins) from the state exchequer? Calcutta High Court had issued an order against it.... But the Bengal government started giving it through the waqf board,” Shah said.

The BJP leader rolled out a long list of allegations against Mamata, all of them bearing religious overtones.

“She does not prevent the entry of Rohingyas... She did not attend the Ram Mandir consecration ceremony. Mamata Didi does not give permission for immersion of Durga idols, but she gives additional holidays during Ramzan,” Shah said.

Sources in the state government said the Bengal administration had been transferring funds to the waqf board to give honorarium to more than 45,000 imams and muezzins after Calcutta High Court issued an order against the scheme, which was run by the minority affairs and madrasa education department.

The imams get an honorarium of ₹ 3,000 a month while the muezzins get ₹ 1,500.

While it was clear that Shah was playing to a strategy, the state government defended the honorarium.

“With the help of the imams and muezzins, the pulse polio immunisation programme could be implemented properly and the polio virus could be eradicated from the state. The honorarium is given because they help the state in implementing various programmes, including vaccination during Covid,” said a source.

Officials pointed out that only imams and muezzins were not given honorarium. “Nearly 4,000 priests of Hindu temples also get an honorarium of ₹ 1,500 a month,” an official said.