Time and again it has been said that the Opposition cannot match the messaging of Narendra Modi. If so, the Opposition should have been at Indian Coffee House on College Street on Monday and taken lessons from the young.
A group of feisty youths led by a woman at Coffee House had this message for a group of saffron-attired BJP supporters censoring “No Vote to BJP” posters: “Khudiramer ei Banglay Nathuramer thain nei (Nathuram has no place in Khudiram’s Bengal).”
The slogan delivers a sledgehammer blow with a feather touch: it recalls Khudiram Bose and the freedom struggle the Sangh parivar would rather forget, it is direct and simple, and it does not leave room for defamation suits to be filed by those who seek now to distance themselves from Nathuram Godse, the assassin of Mahatma Gandhi.
The youths chanted “Tomar bukey Nathuram/ Amar bukey Khudiram (Nathuram in your heart/ Khudiram in mine)” and followed it up with “Khudiramer ei Banglay Nathuramer thain nei.”
Another arrow flew from the youths’ bow and hit home: “Rabi Thakurer matite dangabajer thain nei (There’s no place for rioters in the land of Rabindranath Tagore).”
The BJP group had no answer other than shouting: “Jai Shri Ram” and “Jai jai jai jai jai jai mata, Bharat Mata, Bharat Mata.”
Nehru, the usual whipping boy when the BJP is stuck for answers, was not mentioned.
The BJP supporters had earlier snacked at the Coffee House and on their way out blackened the word “No” from the “No Vote to BJP” posters.
A video shared widely on social media on Wednesday showed the woman (a college teacher) leading the protesters and chanting the slogans as the staircase separated them from the larger group of BJP supporters. The woman’s voice rose above the crescendo and there was little doubt who was winning the argument.
She was joined in the chorus by several others. They continued till the BJP supporters were seen walking down the stairs and leaving.
Madhurima Bakshi, whose vocal power was unmatched in the video, told The Telegraph on Wednesday she had asked the BJP supporters not to deface or tear the “No Vote to BJP” posters.
“They did not listen. They said we had done our job, they were doing theirs. I told them they could paste posters beside ours but they were busy defacing our posters,” the 33-year-old college teacher said.
Madhurima said the slogan invoking Khudiram, who was hanged at the age of 18 for throwing a bomb at a carriage in which he suspected a British judge was travelling, had been in use for quite some time.
“We chant slogans naming icons of Bengal and India who fought against authoritarianism. Khudiram, Tagore, Ishwarchandra Vidyasagar represent Bengal, something that the BJP does not understand,” she said.
Some Calcuttans who saw the video said the image of a woman standing up to a male group of BJP supporters was something the saffron camp would find hard to understand. Many of the party’s leaders have made comments that suggest women are subservient to men, they said.
Earlier on Monday, BJP supporters in saffron T-shirts had parked themselves around several tables inside Coffee House. The picture had been shared by some BJP supporters to project a symbolic takeover of a bastion of Bengali culture.
Subhas Chakraborty, a retired professor of history from Presidency College, said the uniformed BJP brigade smacked of a kind of fascism.
“Anyone can walk into Coffee House. But people wearing some kind of uniform, arriving in a group and sitting inside Coffee House is like a symbolic takeover of the place. This entire methodology smacks of a naked form of fascism,” he said.
Rajesh Roy, a Twitter user, wrote: “So proud!! The might of men being challenged by the lady standing right on that stairs and the unified war cry slowly dissipating away!!! This is Bengal! The might of a woman will always be saluted here!!”
The content of the video drew admiration from political leaders, too. CPM general secretary Sitaram Yechury tweeted: “BJP goons rampaged the iconic Coffee House on College Street, Kolkata, legendary venue that hosted history changing meetings of revolutionaries during the freedom struggle. Tagore renounced his Knighthood here. Kolkata’s youth gave a befitting reply.”
