The Trinamool Congress has slammed Delhi Police for using the term “Bangladeshi language” while referring to Bengali or Bangla, calling it an official attempt to strip a constitutionally recognised language of its identity and portray millions of Bengali-speaking Indians as “outsiders”.
In a post on X on Sunday (August 3), Trinamool shared a copy of a letter written by an inspector posted at the Lodhi Colony police station, addressed to the officer in-charge of Banga Bhawan in New Delhi, requesting a translator for “Bangladeshi language”.
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Delhi Police finds ‘texts written in Bangladeshi’
The letter said during the course of an investigation, eight persons “strongly suspected to be Bangladeshi nationals residing illegally in India without any valid passport or visa were arrested”.
Copies of national ID cards, birth certificates, bank account details, etc., were found from the “suspected Bangladeshi nationals”, the letter said.
The inspector claimed the identification documents contained “texts written in Bangladeshi, which need to be translated to Hindi and English”, requesting for an official translator/interpreter proficient in “Bangladeshi national language”.
Mamata slams Delhi Police
Trinamool Congress supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee described the Centre as anti-Bengali and urged all to stage protests against such “anti-Constitutional language to insult and humiliate Bengali-speaking people of India”.
“See now how Delhi Police under the direct control of the Ministry of Home, Government of India, is describing Bengali as ‘Bangladeshi’ language!” Banerjee posted on her Facebook account, sharing a copy of the letter.
She said Bengali is not only her mother tongue but also the language of Rabindranath Tagore and Swami Vivekananda. She also said that Bengali was the language in which both India’s national anthem, Jana Gana Mana by Tagore and national song Vande Mataram by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay were written.
“… the language in which crores of Indians speak and write, the language which is sanctified and recognised by the Constitution of India, is now described as a Bangladeshi language!!” Banerjee said.
“Scandalous, insulting, anti-national, unconstitutional!! This insults all Bengali-speaking people of India. They cannot use this kind of language, which degrades and debases us all. We urge immediate, strongest possible protests from all against the anti-Bengali Government of India who are using such anti-Constitutional language to insult and humiliate the Bengali-speaking people of India,” she said.
Calculated insult, says TMC
“Is there no limit to BJP’s hatred for Bengalis? After repeatedly harassing and detaining Bengali-speaking workers across BJP-ruled states, Amit Shah’s Delhi Police has now crossed all lines by officially branding our mother tongue, Bangla, as ‘Bangladeshi language’,” Trinamool said in the post.
“Make no mistake — this is not a clerical error. It is a calculated insult, an official attempt to strip a constitutionally recognised Indian language of its identity and portray millions of Bengali-speaking Indians as outsiders in their own country,” it said.
Bangla is spoken by over 25 crore people globally and recognised as one of India’s 22 official languages, it said. “Calling it ‘Bangladeshi’ is a deliberate affront, a vile attempt to delegitimise the language, erase its Indian roots, and brand Bengali speakers as outsiders,” Trinamool said, as it demanded an “unconditional apology, immediate correction, and strict action against the officials responsible for it”.
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‘Bulldozer of stupid majoritarian arrogance’
CPI (ML) Liberation general secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya also slammed Delhi Police, and said that “persecution of Bengali-speaking migrant workers as ‘suspected Bangladeshi nationals’ has now become an outright negation of India’s second-most-spoken language as ‘Bangladeshi language’”.
“Never before has India’s multi-religious, multi-lingual mosaic faced such a bulldozer of stupid majoritarian arrogance and parochialism. Fascism is a threat to not just democracy and diversity but also India’s national unity,” Bhattacharya said.
“We, the people of India, will have to resist this attack on India’s linguistic diversity and multicultural unity with all our might,” he added.
(With agency inputs)