Senior Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader Abhishek Banerjee sharply criticized Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar and BJP MPs at a rally in Alipurduar on Saturday, alleging illegitimate voter deletions during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in West Bengal. The rally marked the second of 26 stops in his 19-day statewide campaign, Abar Jitbe Bangla (“Bengal will win again”).

Addressing concerns over the ongoing SIR, Banerjee accused the Election Commission of arbitrarily removing eligible voters from the rolls. “Do you know Gyanesh Kumar? He is a magician. He can make living beings disappear from voter lists and make the dead walk. He is now ‘Vanish Kumar’,” the TMC national general secretary said, claiming that party leaders had sought transparency from the poll panel without satisfactory response.

Banerjee likened the SIR to the demonetisation exercise of 2016, asserting that the government is misleading citizens and trying to control who is eligible to vote. “Ten years ago, people queued up chasing dreams; now they are being made to stand in lines while the government decides who can vote,” he alleged.

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Turning his focus on the BJP, the TMC leader compared saffron party MPs to snakes, warning voters against trusting them. “A snake will always remain a snake. It may drink milk and eat bananas offered by you, but it will still bite,” he said, urging voters to support TMC in the upcoming elections and cautioning against losing welfare benefits like the Lakshmir Bhandar scheme.

Banerjee emphasized the strategic importance of Alipurduar, a BJP stronghold since 2019, calling on voters to ensure victory in every booth. He claimed that the BJP is attempting to undermine democratic rights and curtail state welfare schemes, urging citizens to turn out in large numbers and use electronic voting machines to “teach a lesson.”

The TMC leader also criticized BJP-ruled states over governance failures, referencing recent incidents such as water contamination in Madhya Pradesh. He warned that parties unable to provide basic services could not be trusted with governance, framing the 2026 assembly elections as decisive for protecting voter rights and the state’s development.

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