The 2021 assembly election in West Bengal is fast becoming one of the most eagerly awaited political contests of recent times. There are signs of rising Hindu assertiveness in a region which gave rise to some of the biggest Hindu stalwarts of the modern era such as Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, Swami Vivekananda, Sri Aurobindo, Bipin Chandra Pal, Subhash Chandra Bose etc, before going into a deep stupor post Independence.
Ruling TMC led by Mamata Banerjee is clearly rattled due to the rise of BJP, and a slew of defections currently underway out of TMC indicate that a deep political churning is underway in Bengal.
Amidst all this, Hindu Samhati stands as an organisation which has played a key role in awakening Bengali Hindus to their plight and helping them resist the multifarious injustices being meted out to them by Islamic aggression, unchecked illegal immigration and a hostile political establishment.
The organisation was founded in 2008 by the indomitable Tapan Ghosh, an ex-RSS pracharak who passed away recently. It is active in parts of Jharkhand and Assam too, apart from its base in West Bengal. Currently, it is led by Shri Debtanu Bhattacharya.
In an exclusive chat with HinduPost, Shri Bhattacharya confirmed that Hindu Samhati will float a new political outfit to contest the upcoming assembly elections. It plans to fight in around 150 seats, out of total 294 seats in the WB assembly.
When asked whether this could cut into the Hindu vote which appears to be consolidating behind BJP (BJP won 18 out of 42 LS seats in the 2019 general elections recording an impressive 40.2% vote share, just behind TMC’s 43.3%), he said –
“It’s not the responsibility of other Hindu organisations alone to consolidate the Hindu vote behind BJP. BJP needs to realise that Hindus in every region have a separate identity, whether it is Tamil, Malayalam or Bengali Hindus. If this regional Hindu identity is not recognised and nurtured, it can be used to foster regional separatism.
For eg., there is a movement within Bengal that says that Bengali Hindus have more in common with Bengali Muslims, even those in Bangladesh. This is wrong and dangerous. We stand for Hindutva at the centre and regional Hindu identity at local level.”
To the question whether BJP and Hindu Samhati could enter a pre-poll alliance, Shri Bhattacharya said that his organisation would be open to discussing any such proposal from BJP, if it were to arrive.
With news of the rabidly Islamist party AIMIM also entering the fray in West Bengal for the first time ever, and AIMIM sources expressing willingness for an alliance with the TMC if approached, the coming elections are shaping up into a high-stakes electoral battle which will have repercussions far beyond the state.
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