The BJP’s beleaguered Bengal unit has found in the Bogtui carnage a weapon to hit out at the state government in stark contrast to its restraint in the aftermath of the alleged murder of student leader Anis Khan last month.
BJP insiders said Anis’s religion and stance against the saffron camp’s core agenda of the citizenship matrix had acted as a deterrent for the party to take up his death as an issue against the state government.
“Anis was an active part of protests that had rocked the nation and Calcutta against Narendra Modi government’s decision to implement the NRC- CAA. Several BJP supporters and office-bearers took to the social media and called him a terrorist and anti-national. Though the party condemned the death of Anis, it did not hit the streets,” said a state committee member.
“It would have been an embarrassment for the party to take up the cause of someone opposed to the core ideals of the BJP,” the BJP leader said and said the party had called off a rally it had announced to protest Anis’s death.
The Bogtui massacre, on the other hand, doesn’t come with such baggage. Although Trinamul supporters belonging to the Muslim community were killed at Bogtui, the BJP has decided to go all out on this issue as six women and a child were among the eight victims.
A BJP state office-bearer said Bogtui had handed them a weapon to “unveil” Mamata’s anti-minority reality.
“Mamata Banerjee had publicly accepted in 2019 that Muslims are her vote bank. Now, her own party cadres have massacred Muslim women and children in Bogtui,” the leader said and added the incident helped to bring together the faction-ridden state unit that had faced an electoral setback in the recent civic polls.
While the Left moved up to the second slot in terms of vote share, the BJP, which had emerged as the main Opposition party in state following last year’s Assembly polls, did not win a single civic body among the 108 in the civic elections held in February.
BJP leaders claimed a unified face of the party would be on show in Calcutta on Monday in a massive rally against the Bogtui killings and alleged breakdown of law and order in the state.
“All our senior leaders will take part in the march on Monday,” said a party MP.
In the Bogtui killings, the BJP has also found a validation of their allegations of post-poll violence. Multiple BJP leaders — including party’s chief spokesperson Samik Bhattacharya — have publicly compared the Bogtui massacre to what BJP supporters went through in Bengal after results of the Assembly polls were declared on May 2, 2021.
The BJP has been raising the issue of the Bogtui massacre and leverage its position at the Centre to demand imposition of Article 356 in the state, another BJP leader said.
“Did we have any other option? We did nothing with Anis’s murder and CPM hogged the limelight. We could not have done anything different but to join the outcry against the Bogtui killings,” another state BJP MLA said.
The party’s rivals have derided these efforts.
“The BJP has lost its connect with people after repeated poll defeats. They are looking to politicise dead bodies for political benefits," Kunal Ghosh, Trinamul spokesperson.
“Where was the BJP all this while?” CPM leader Samik Lahiri said, questioning the BJP’s decision to bring out a rally on the day of a general strike on Monday.
