KOLKATA: The demand for a separate state or union territory status for north Bengal is because of neglect by Kolkata.
On Wednesday, Sukanta Majumdar, the West Bengal BJP president who is also Minister of State for Education and Development of the North-eastern Region (DONER), posted a video on his X handle, saying he had met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and submitted a proposal to him requesting him to include six north Bengal districts in the NEC. “As a part of Bengal, the region can be included in the NEC so that more Central funds can be made available to expedite the development of the region,” Majumdar said.
The NEC, which covers seven states of the Northeast and Sikkim, was set up in 1972. Since 1998-99, 10% of the annual planned budget of 52 Central Ministries has been earmarked for the Northeast. In 2023-24, Rs 5,892 crore was allocated for the Ministry of DONER.
The statement set off a political firestorm as the Trinamool Congress strongly protested the proposal. It has gone all out to attack the BJP as “anti-Bengal”, accusing the saffron party of trying to divide the state. It also triggered deep disquiet within the state BJP, which is still to recover from repeated electoral drubbings at the hands of the ruling Trinamool Congress.
The development is being seen as Majumdar trying to consolidate the BJP’s core support in the state, one that has given electoral dividends to the party. After all, he was re-elected from the Balurghat Lok Sabha seat in South Dinajpur, an impoverished district in north Bengal.
While most would agree to Majumdar’s theory that the northern parts of Bengal (comprising the districts of Darjeeling, Jalpaiguri, Coochbehar, North Dinajpur, South Dinajpur and Malda) have remained impoverished, lagging behind in development as compared to the plains of south Bengal, any suggestion of a possible division of the state is fraught with major risk of a political backlash.
The reaction came the next day when Kurseong’s BJP MLA Bishnu Prasad Sharma slammed Sukanta Majumdar’s proposal. He termed it as an attempt to retain the party’s base in the region, keeping in mind the Assembly elections of 2026.
“It is a utopian thought and is not feasible. Sukanta Majumdar has mooted the proposal to conceal his failure in the recent Lok Sabha polls and retain the BJP’s base in north Bengal as the Assembly elections will be due in a few years. He is simply trying to confuse people,” Sharma said.
“He can think of including north Bengal in the NEC… but that can be done only after the region is separated from Bengal and a separate state or union territory is created,” the MLA added.
However, Darjeeling MP Raju Bista said Majumdar’s comment was a reflection of the “voice of the people”. “Our culture and language are very similar to the Northeast. Geographically also, we are aligned to the Northeast. We have been historically deprived in the state budget. I think this demand should be seriously considered. The TMC has always looted north Bengal,” he said.
Samik Bhattacharya, the BJP’s spokesperson in the state, tried to contain the damage because of discordant notes against Majumdar.
“Let me assert that the BJP is determined to keep Bengal’s territory intact. But it is a fact that only a minor portion of the state’s budget is allocated for north Bengal. Further, only a percentage of it is eventually spent in the region,” said Bhattacharya, a Rajya Sabha member.
BJP’s Rajya Sabha member Nagen Roy reiterated the Rajbanshi community’s longstanding demand for the Greater Cooch Behar state.
“The Centre should first meet our demand and then, the region can be included in the NEC,” said Roy, who heads a faction of the Greater Cooch Behar Peoples’ Association.
With Majumdar rooting for the NEC’s extension to north Bengal and two BJP lawmakers reasserting their demands for separate states, the ruling dispensation of Bengal alleged that the saffron camp was playing the divisive card.
“BJP has always conspired to divide Bengal… They had earlier joined hands with Bimal Gurung. But let us be clear that if the BJP moves ahead with this proposal, it will lose whatever little support it has in the northern parts of the state,” said senior Trinamool Congress MP Sudip Bandyopadhyay.
Jagadish Chandra Barma Basunia, the Trinamool Congress MP who defeated BJP’s Minister of State for Home, Nisith Pramanik in Cooch Behar in the Lok Sabha elections, claimed that north Bengal had developed during Trinamool’s regime.
“There have been huge infrastructure and socio-economic developments in north Bengal. We will not allow further division of Bengal,” said Basunia.
Complicating matters further was Nishikant Dubey, the BJP MP from Godda in Jharkhand, who raised the demand for a new union territory in the Parliament on Thursday.
“We want a union territory comprising the Malda and Murshidabad districts of Bengal and the districts of Kishanganj, Araria, and Katihar of Bihar. In these districts, the demography is changing faster, and thus, this step is needed,” said Dubey.
Trinamool Congress scoffed at his remark. “It seems the BJP has taken a strategy to raise the demand of a union territory in areas where it has lost at the Lok Sabha elections,” said Trinamool spokesperson Kunal Ghosh.
Trinamool Congress MP Kalyan Banerjee, during the Zero Hour on Friday, raised the issue of “division” of West Bengal.
Political scientist Biswanath Chakraborty told The Sunday Guardian: “Historically, there has been a perception among residents in north Bengal that the region has been neglected in terms of development and infrastructure compared to Kolkata and adjoining areas in the southern part of the state. Sukanta Majumdar’s request should be seen as reinforcing that very sentiment.”
For decades, West Bengal has been plagued by violent separatist movements like the Gorkhaland agitation in the Darjeeling hills. It demanded a separate state for the non-Bengali Nepali-speaking Gorkha population in West Bengal.
Similarly, the banned militant outfit Kamtapur Liberation Organisation (KLO) has been demanding a separate state of Kamatapur for the Koch Rajbanshi community by carving out portions from West Bengal and Assam.
The BJP has reaped electoral benefits in the region with direct support from both the Gorkha and Rajbongshi communities. The party has won the Darjeeling Lok Sabha seat for four consecutive terms since 2009. It also won in Coochbehar for the first time in 2019. Out of the 12 Lok Sabha seats the BJP has won in Bengal this year, six seats (50%) are from north Bengal—Darjeeling, Jalpaiguri, Alipurduar, Balurghat, Raiganj and Malda Uttar (North).
However, the saffron party has not been able to breach South Bengal, considered a Trinamool Congress fortress. Out of the 29 seats the Trinamool Congress has bagged, it has won only a single seat in north Bengal, while sweeping southern Bengal.
“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 Prime Minister has no power to accept such an unconstitutional and illegal demand. This is an evil design of the BJP to bifurcate the state as it is suffering humiliating defeats in all elections since 2011,” said veteran Trinamool Congress Rajya Sabha MP Sukhendu Sekhar Ray.
The concept of a separate North Bengal is not new. The British colonial administration recognised the distinctiveness of the region, which was administratively separate from the rest of Bengal. After Independence, the region’s unique needs and its strategic importance, bordering several countries, led to periodic discussions about its autonomy.
In recent decades, the demand for a separate state or union territory status for north Bengal has resurfaced, driven by perceived neglect from the state government in Kolkata. Proponents argue that the region’s integration with the Northeast could bring economic development, better infrastructure, and more targeted governance, leveraging the Centre’s schemes tailored for the northeastern states.
Also, proponents of bifurcation argue that the economic disparity between north Bengal and south Bengal is huge, and north Bengal, despite its rich natural resources, including tea gardens and forests, and its strategic location, has lagged in industrial development and infrastructural growth. The region’s integration with the Northeast, which receives special economic packages from the Centre, could potentially bridge this gap, they argue.