Apologise: CM, party keep up ‘Bankim insult’ heat in Parl and outside
Times of India | 10 December 2025
Kolkata/New Delhi: Was Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay "some Shyam-da or Hari-da", CM Mamata Banerjee asked PM Narendra Modi on Tuesday, as the Trinamool stepped up its protests in the Parliament and on Kolkata streets a day after the latter called the Vande Mataram author "Bankim-da" in the Lok Sabha.
Bengal would never forgive the slight, Banerjee said, addressing an anti-SIR rally on Coochbehar's Rashmela Ground. "He (PM) referred to Chattopadhyay as if he was just some ‘Shyam-da' or ‘Hari-da'. You should bow your head and ask for forgiveness from people for disrespecting the country's history and freedom struggle," she added.
The PM had referred to Chattopadhyay as ‘Bankim-da' during a debate on Vande Mataram in Lok Sabha on Monday, prompting Trinamool MP Saugata Roy to object to the "slight". Modi, on his part, accepted Roy's contention, saying, "I will say Bankim-babu. Thank you, I respect your sentiments." He then asked in a lighter vein whether he could still address Roy as "dada".
"You (the BJP) said Raja Ram Mohan Roy was not a patriot. They called Khudiram Bose a terrorist. They broke Vidyasagar's statue," the CM said on Tuesday, claiming that over 90% freedom fighters who sacrificed their lives for India's independence were from Bengal. "Who struggled the most for independence? It was Bengal. Countless people were jailed, hanged and martyred. Where were you then?" she asked the BJP.
Trinamool Congress MPs on Tuesday held a silent protest in the Central Hall of Parliament to protest against the "repeated insults" of Bengal icons like Rabindranath Tagore and Chattopadhyay by the BJP. Later, they took their protest to gates of the Samvidhan Sadan.
"We held this silent protest in sorrow and in outrage (to protest against) the manner in which none other than the country's PM insulted Bengal's ‘sahitya samrat' (and) insulted our great icon Tagore," Trinamool Rajya Sabha deputy leader Sagarika Ghose later said. "Attempts were made to defame, to humiliate and to injure the people of Bengal, the culture of Bengal and the icons of Bengal," she added, demanding an apology to the people of Bwngal.
The Trinamool Mahila Congress in Kolkata took out a march from the Academy of Fine Arts to Esplanade to mark the 79th anniversary of the first meeting of the Constituent Assembly and pledged to "protect the rights of Bengal". But this march, too, turned into a protest against the PM's "Bankim-da" reference with placards asking the BJP "how much lower it would stoop".