Bengal Assembly passes motion to declare Poila Baisakh as statehood day

A motion to declare the first day of the Bengali lunar calendar as Bangla Diwas or statehood day was brought before the Assembly on Thursday. Bengal BJP MLAs fiercely opposed it and voted against it.

Suvendu Adhikari, the leader of the opposition, vowed to thwart the plan by requesting that governor C.V. Ananda Bose deny his approval.

Although Bengal's governing party would approve the resolution in the House with a huge majority, the Nandigram MLA said that the governor would never endorse it.

"We'll advise the governor not to sign the resolution, " This motion won't be accepted. It should be marked on June 20 since that is when Paschim Banga Diwas has traditionally fallen on the calendar, Adhikari said in the House.

The BJP contends that June 20 should be recognized as Statehood Day since it marks the day West Bengal officially became a state in 1947. According to them, Syama Prasad Mookerjee, a leader of the Jana Sangh, was responsible for Bengal's establishment by his assertive participation in the Assembly on June 20, 1947.

However, several historians assert that on June 20, 1947, the Bengal Assembly decided on whether the province should join East Pakistan or stay in India after the Partition. Two rounds of voting took place.

Sugata Bose, a historian and former Trinamul MP, has described June 20 as a "sad footnote" in history on several occasions. In a piece for The Telegraph, Bose said that on June 20, 1947, East Bengal lawmakers voted against Partition by 106 votes to 35, while West Bengal legislators voted in favor of Partition by 58 votes to 21. Following Partition, Pakistan received the Bengal province's Muslim-dominated portions, while India received the region's Hindu-dominated sections.

Although Bengal has never celebrated a day commemorating its statehood, Raj Bhavan's intention to do so in response to a directive from the Union home minister generated a contentious discussion. On June 20 of this year, Governor Bose marked Statehood Day, to which Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee vehemently objected, even in writing.

The Speaker created a committee with Bose as its advisor to oppose the "imposition" of a statehood day on Bengal, and the committee proposed to observe Poila Baisakh as statehood day.

On Thursday, a proposal was brought before the House to recognize Poila Baisakh as the day of statehood.

As soon as he stepped foot inside the Assembly's doors on Thursday morning, Adhikari set the tone of abrasive opposition to the resolution. He wore a T-shirt with the words "June 20, Paschim Banga Diwas" and the picture of Mookerjee as he moved near the monument of B.R. Ambedkar. All of the other saffron MLAs received comparable T-shirts, which they wore inside the House.

Biman Banerjee, the speaker, asked Adhikari to take off the T-shirt, but the latter refused. According to Banerjee, the Speaker may ask a member to refrain from wearing a certain attire in the House under the terms of the Assembly's regulations. Adhikari, though, insisted that it was his basic right to dress whatever he pleased.

Adhikari, Shankar Ghosh, and Agnimitra Paul, three BJP MLAs, said Trinamul was attempting to obliterate Bengal's past by disregarding June 20 as statehood day.

They maintained that since Mookerjee had assisted in creating West Bengal on June 20, 1947, honoring any other date as the state's founding day was a disrespect to him.

When Adhikari declared, "I will ask the central government to officially declare June 20 as the Paschim Banga Diwas so that it can be observed nationally," Trinamul MLAs immediately objected.

He abstained, as did his party's other members.

Later, Adhikari organized a demonstration with his colleagues, who then delivered a nine-page letter to the governor at Raj Bhavan. The governor thanked the BJP MLAs for supporting Mookerjee's views in the Assembly, he later informed press.

"He (Gov. Bose) informed us that Droupadi Murmu, the President of India, tweeted from her official account to thank the people of Bengal for celebrating Paschim Banga Diwas on June 20. Nobody has the right to disparage the President, he said," Adhikari remarked.