West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee led a large-scale protest march in Kolkata on Tuesday against the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls initiated by the Election Commission. The Trinamool Congress (TMC), her party, condemned the SIR exercise as "silent invisible rigging" orchestrated by the BJP-led central government in collusion with the Election Commission.
The 3.8-km rally started from the statue of BR Ambedkar on Red Road and concluded at Jorasanko Thakur Bari, the ancestral home of Rabindranath Tagore. Thousands of TMC supporters lined the route waving party flags, chanting slogans, and carrying posters urging opposition to the SIR.
Banerjee, dressed in her trademark white cotton saree and slippers, led from the front, pausing often to greet cheering supporters from balconies and pavements. Her nephew and TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee was part of the rally and criticized the BJP sharply, saying, "If we can arrange such a huge gathering in two days, imagine our turnout in Delhi protests." He also accused the SIR process of causing fear that has led to several deaths, citing seven people who died fearing voter deletion.
The BJP and Election Commission maintain that the SIR is aimed at ensuring transparency and cleansing the voter list of illegal entries. However, TMC accuses it of targeting Muslim voters and other opposition supporters unfairly, linking the exercise to the controversial National Register of Citizens (NRC). Mamata Banerjee contested BJP’s claims by stating that speaking Bengali does not imply being a Bangladeshi, just as speaking Hindi or Punjabi does not mean being Pakistani. She further slammed the BJP as a "lootera party" spreading misinformation.
The opposition BJP responded with its own "Parivartan Yatra" rally and criticized Mamata’s protest. West Bengal BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari called the TMC rally "against the ethos of the Indian constitution," and Bengal BJP president Samik Bhattacharya accused Mamata of pandering to illegal immigrants to win votes.
As Bengal moves toward assembly elections in 2026, the SIR exercise and the political mobilizations it has triggered mark a significant flashpoint exposing deep divisions over electoral rolls and citizenship issues in the state.
