In a video statement issued from Delhi, Majumdar, who is also Union Minister of State for Education, said, “I met with the Prime Minister and handed over a presentation highlighting the similarities between north Bengal and North East states. I requested him to incorporate north Bengal, a part of West Bengal, into the North East (states).”

“The Prime Minister will decide on the proposal in due time. If North Bengal is incorporated into the North East, it will benefit from the Central government schemes. There will be more development. I do not think the state government will have objections and will cooperate,” Majumdar, an MP from Balurghat in north Bengal, added.

In the recent past, BJP leaders and MPs have raised the demand of a separate state of North Bengal to be carved out from West Bengal.

Also, the BJP is a dominant political force in North Bengal. It won five of the seven Lok Sabha seats in the north in the recently concluded Lok Sabha elections. In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP had won six of the seven constituencies in North Bengal.

Reacting sharply to the BJP leader’s proposal, TMC MP Sukhendu Sekhar Ray said, “This is a secessionist move on the part of a Union Minister. He has violated the oath of office under the Constitution. North Bengal is an integral part of West Bengal. Even the PM has no power to accept such unconstitutional and illegal demands. This is an evil design of the BJP to bifurcate West Bengal as it has faced humiliating defeats in all the elections in the state since 2011.”

TMC spokesperson Riju Dutta posted on X: “Anti-Bengal, Anti-Bengali. BJP is up to their old tricks again… Let me be very clear to the descendants of Radcliffe. Bengal has been partitioned before causing tremendous agony to millions, who lost everything…We will not let that happen again. We will fight to the last drop of our blood to protect the sovereignty, integrity and boundary of Bengal! Bengal will never be divided again.”

In 2021, John Barla, the then BJP MP from Alipurduar, also in north Bengal, had raised the issue of a separate state for North Bengal. He demanded a separate Union Territory or state to be carved out of the northern parts of West Bengal.

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