Leaders of the Trinamool Congress on Friday (November 21, 2025) reacted sharply to Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s statements against political parties ‘opposed to the removal of infiltrators’ through the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.
“Mr Amit Shah is the incapable Home Minister who failed to prevent the Pahalgam terror attack and the Delhi blasts. He is now talking about infiltrators. But who guards the borders, Mr. Amit Shah? It is you… if infiltrators are coming in, that is your failure and the failure of your Ministry,” Trinamool Congress Rajya Sabha MP Sagarika Ghose said on Tuesday, adding that the Home Minister ‘should resign’.
She further said that the ongoing SIR exercise in West Bengal, which has been consistently opposed by the ruling Trinamool Congress, is aimed at disenfranchising citizens and causing enormous hardship and pain to “bonafide citizens of India”.
A day before Mr. Shah’s remarks on infiltrators and the necessity of the SIR at the Border Security Force’s 61st Raising Day in Gujarat’s Bhuj, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee wrote to Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, raising concerns around the ongoing SIR of the West Bengal’s voters’ lists, calling it ‘unplanned’, ‘chaotic’ and ‘dangerous.’
“At Gujarat, [Mr. Shah] said a lot while hinting at Bengal, about infiltrators, democracy, national security, and opposition to SIR. It is true that our country is suffering from a lack of national security. If we had known earlier, so many tourists would not have been killed by terrorists at Pahalgam,” Trinamool Minister Shashi Panja said on Tuesday.
Citing the recent bomb blasts in Delhi, she added that the country’s borders are not secure enough and are being breached by outsiders.
“Such cases of inadequate national security are going unnoticed by you. But you are hinting at Bengal [in the context of infiltration]… Through SIR, you want to create panic among the people of Bengal. You do not want a political fight, you want to capture Bengal by any means possible,” Dr. Panja said, addressing the Home Minister and the saffron party.
She also referred to the deaths of 31 people in West Bengal, allegedly over fears and panic of SIR, and raised questions on whether the pain of the bereaved families does not affect him.
Shah’s vow against infiltrators
The ire of Trinamool leaders was provoked by Mr. Shah’s remarks that while some political parties are opposing the removal of infiltrators and the SIR process, the BJP-led Union government will remove ‘each and every infiltrator from this country, one by one’.
“Irrespective of who the Chief Minister or the Prime Minister is, [elections] can be determined only by Indian citizens and not by infiltrators. No infiltrator has the right to soil our democratic systems or influence our democratic decisions,” the Home Minister said.
He further said that the SIR is meant to “protect and purify” the country’s democracy.
“I want to tell the political parties opposed to the pushback of infiltrators that the election in Bihar is the mandate of the people of this country, and their mandate is against infiltrators. The party that is working to secure the presence of infiltrators in our voters’ lists should know that the people of the country will never support such intentions,” Mr. Shah said.
Mr Shah’s statements assume significance in West Bengal, where Assembly polls are scheduled to be held within the next six months. Saffron party leaders including the Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari have celebrated the ongoing SIR as an effective tool to remove ‘Bangladeshi infiltrators’ from the State’s electoral rolls.
Mamata writes to CEC
The Trinamool Congress has consistently resisted the three-month-long SIR, alleging deaths of 31 common citizens due to panic and fear, and the “unrealistic workload” of on-ground booth-level officers (BLOs) tasked with distributing, collecting, and digitising enumeration forms.
“The manner in which this exercise is being forced upon officials and citizens is not only unplanned and chaotic, but also dangerous. The absence of even basic preparedness, adequate planning or clear communication has crippled the process from day on. Critical gaps in training, lack of clarity on mandatory documentation, and the near impossibility of meeting voters in the midst of their livelihood schedules have made the exercise structurally unsound,” Ms. Banerjee wrote in her letter on Thursday (November 20, 2025.
Meanwhile, seven booth-level officers of the Beliaghata Assembly constituency in Kolkata North have been issued show cause notices by the Election Commission, allegedly for not digitizing enough enumeration forms on time through the BLO app.
“The BLOs had been asked to respond within Friday noon on why they were unable to perform their duties timely enough, failing which might lead to penal action. While we are aware of some glitches within the BLO App, the digitisation needs to be done regularly to ensure it is completed within December 4,” an election official said.
Published – November 21, 2025 05:21 pm IST
