Opinion J P Nadda to Khagen Murmu: BJP leaders have come under attack in Bengal over the years

The attack on Murmu and Ghosh is not the first time a BJP leader has come under attack in the state. Since 2020, the state BJP has frequently accused TMC workers of attacking its leaders. The Mamata Banerjee-led party has denied involvement in these attacks.

• In July 2020, then state BJP president Dilip Ghosh was accosted by a group of villagers in Rajarhat while he was out for a morning walk. While Ghosh’s security stopped them, a stone was thrown at the BJP leader’s car, damaging it.
• In October 2020, current BJP state president Samik Bhattacharya came under attack in Mohanpur, 50 km from Kolkata, while on his way to Diamond Harbour in South 24 Parganas district to attend a protest. The windscreen of Bhattacharya’s car was smashed, his driver assaulted, and the BJP leader himself was assaulted.
• The following month, Ghosh’s convoy was attacked in Kandi in Murshidabad district while he was on his way to attend a party event in Baharampur.
• In December 2020, BJP president J P Nadda and then party national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya’s convoy was attacked in Diamond Harbour. The BJP blamed it on TMC workers and alleged that the police did not intervene to stop the attack. Vijayvargiya was injured.
• In May 2021, days after the TMC returned to power, then Union Minister V Muraleedharan’s convoy came under attack while he was on his way to  Ghatal in Paschim Medinipur district to meet BJP workers who were allegedly victims of post-poll violence. In a viral video shared by the BJP,  a group of masked men was seen hitting Muraleedharan’s car with sticks and throwing stones.
• In February 2023, then Union MoS for Home Nisith Pramanik’s convoy was attacked in the Dinhata area of Cooch Behar district while he was making his way to a local party office. The BJP alleged that stones were pelted at the convoy and bombs were hurled, while the police refused to step in.
• Pramanik again came under attack in June 2023 outside the Sahebganj BDO office in Cooch Behar while the scrutiny process of nomination papers for panchayat polls was in progress. The Union MoS alleged that stones were pelted and arrows were shot at his convoy.
• In May 2024, the BJP’s Jhargram candidate Pranat Tudu came under attack during polling in his constituency. The attack, in which Tudu’s security personnel were injured, occurred when the BJP leader was visiting a polling booth in Garbeta.
• This August, Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari’s convoy was attacked when he and other leaders were on their way to the office of Cooch Behar SP to submit a deputation on reports of attacks on BJP leaders. Stones and bricks were thrown at the BJP convoy, damaging several vehicles.

“They think they can scare us, but we will not be intimidated. TMC rule will soon be in the past,” Samik Bhattacharya told The Indian Express.

TMC spokesperson Jay Prakash Majumdar said while the attack on Murmu and Ghosh was unfortunate, it occurred because they went to the village for a “photo op”.

“How do they expect poor people who have lost everything to behave? Khagen Murmu has no connection with the hills. This was nothing but public anger from people who are under tremendous distress. BJP people were making a mockery of the loss of the poor. The previous attacks were all election-related issues. When elections approach, there are certain points of friction. The BJP doesn’t have any connection to the grassroots and no one wants them,” Majumdar told The Indian Express.

Who is Khagen Murmu?

The 65-year-old Murmu is a popular BJP MP who represents Maldaha Uttar, with his base in the Habibpur and Gazole Assembly segments of the Lok Sabha constituency. A three-time CPI(M) MLA, the tribal leader moved to the BJP before the 2019 parliamentary elections and defeated Trinamool Congress’s (TMC) Mausam Noor, the niece of late Congress leader and Maldaha strongman A B A Ghani Khan Choudhury, to enter the Lok Sabha.

Murmu was born in a family of modest means in Gazole and during his schooldays got involved with the CPI(M) after the Left Front government started Operation Barga, its land reform programme, in 1978, a year after coming to power.

“He was not especially good in his studies but had beautiful handwriting. He was close to veteran CPI(M) leader Ranjit Chakraborty, who deployed him for registration for Operation Barga because of his beautiful handwriting,” said a senior CPI(M) leader in Malda.

Murmu continued his political career in the farmers’ organisation of the CPI(M), the All India Kisan Sabha, and even served as the Zilla Sabhadhipati. In 2006, he was elected to the West Bengal Assembly for the first time from Habibpur and remained in the position till 2019, when he switched to the BJP to end the almost four-decade run of Ghani Khan Choudhury’s family in Maldaha. In 2014, he contested from Maldaha Uttar on a CPI(M) ticket, finishing second to Noor who was then in the Congress.

“Murmu won the Lok Sabha polls twice because of the polarisation of votes in three Assembly constituencies: Habibpur, Gazole, and Maldaha. In 2024, he trailed in the Malatipur, Harishchandrapur, Chanchal, and Ratua Assembly segments but took a handsome lead in Habibpur, Gazole and Old Malda (which is part of the Maldaha seat), which helped him win by a margin of almost 77,000.”