THE GREAT HINDU VOTE TRICK

THEY COMPRISE 70 PER CENT OF THE POPULATION OF THE STATE, AND ARE BEING PROPITIATED BY BOTH THE BJP AND MAMATA BANERJEE’S TMC. BUT WILL THE BENGALI HINDUS VOTE EN BLOC?

- Romita Datta

The strains of a shehnai in the background, the aroma of ‘dhuno’ incense filling the air, the chants of ‘Chandi Paath (shlokas dedicated to goddess Durga)’ and the beats of the ‘dhaak’. Durga Puja at the Eastern Zonal Cultural Centre in Kolkata’s Salt Lake— the West Bengal BJP’s first ever—was a quintessential Bengali affair, marked by the presence of party leaders keen to look at home. If the male ushers—among them national leaders like Kailash Vijayvargiya and RSS pracharaks like Arvind Menon and Shiv Prakash loaned to the BJP—wore dhuti-panjabi, the women leaders, such as Locket Chatterjee and Agnimitra Paul, wore the traditional ‘laal paar (red-bordered)’ saris.

The festivities were opened by Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself, albeit virtually. Wearing tussar silk, sourced from Bengal, he peppered his address with references to Bengal’s history, traditions, icons and proverbs. He had done his home work and paid tribute to the intellectual and cultural prowess of Bengalis, to the leading lights of the Bengal Renaissance and their contribution to nation-building. Modi sought to be excused for his Bengali pronunciation, but added that he found the “sweetness of the language” irresistible.