BENGALIS ALWAYS TAKEN FOR GRANTED!
KAJAL CHATTERJEE
West Bengal Chief minister Mamata Banerjee is being urged from certain quarters to cooperate with the Centre in sharing Teesta's waters with Bangladesh (by putting "regional" issues aside for the "national interest") so that India can achieve friendly ties with the neighboring country!
May those "nationalists" be humbly asked whether "regional" West Bengal do not form part of the Indian nation or lakhs of residents and farmers of North Bengal are not Indian citizens! So when West Bengal and it's residents and farmers living in the Northern part of the state will get affected due to the scarcity of water for irrigation and drinking ; wouldn't interest of India/Indians get hurt! Or they mean to assert that one and only Bengal /Bengalis would have to sacrifice their interest livelihood and amenities of basic existence so that India ie Narendra Modi and the NDA government can shine diplomatically in international arena!
Why will always Bengalis have to sacrifice for the cause of India! Of course Punjabis also had to sacrifice their land livelihood and lives due to communal arson following the wake of the Partition of India along with the Bengalis, but at least the displaced lot from West Punjab were offered handsome compensation and rehabilitation policies including transfer of enemy property. In contrast the Bengali refugees were awarded step-motherly treatment and so they had to fight for survival on the streets of Kolkata/West Bengal through sheer own steam or settle in arid lands and unfriendly jungles of Central India or Andaman Islands!
It seems that the community which had shed maximum blood than people of any other Indian community, boldly walked up to the gallows with heads held high and led a horrible torturous life in that dreaded Cellular jail (without allowing themselves liberty by praying for clemency unlike any pusillanimous "braveheart") just for the sake of achieving freedom from British rule are always taken for granted by the independent Indian State - - be it in post-Partition scenario or even today as being clearly reflected by the ridiculous "moral sermons" of the "nationalists" and mysterious stance of the Centre which suggests that despite India being a confederation with a federal set-up, West Bengal government has not been taken into confidence before hinting about an assurance to Bangladesh to share Teesta waters!
In this undiluted anti-Bengal context, the President's address to the Parliament (though prepared by the NDA government) is also extremely relevant. While the recent scandals of paper leaks in national-level tests are being not only awarded a "fig leaf" of sorts by unnecessarily bringing in "many instances of paper leaks in different states", "cardinal call" of "rising above party politics" is also getting liberally issued!
The matter of irony remains that such call of being "non-partisan" during tragedies and scandals get delivered only when such man-made calamities/development happen in "saffron" states or in the Central level with BJP at the helm of affairs (2020 New Delhi communal arson, 2022 Morbi bridge collapse, 2023 Bahanaga railway mishap or the recent accident in West Bengal with the Kanchanjunga Express getting knocked from behind by a goods train)! But if a flyover collapses in Kolkata's Burrabazar/ Majherhat or any allegation of examination related scandal crops up in West Bengal ; without any ifs and buts immediately West Bengal government, West Bengal, Kolkata, Bengalis, TMC and Mamata Banerjee get attacked in most philistine mode possible along with the atrocious demand of the Chief Minister's resignation and bizarre call of imposing President's Rule in West Bengal!
Apart from exhibition of the blatant hypocrisy of BJP, the traditional indifference meted to the Bengali community in independent India must also be seriously condemned.