PM Modi said that Syama Prasad Mookerjee emerged as the key figure who resisted such efforts and launched a movement for a separate homeland for Bengali Hindus within India.
Photo: SNS
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, on the first official Paschimbanga Divas celebration, credited Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee for leading the movement that ensured a part of Bengal remained within India and called for greater awareness among younger generations about the events that shaped the state’s future.
Modi said that the observance of this key historical event, is not merely ceremonial but a reminder of a decisive chapter in Bengal’s history when efforts were allegedly made to separate the whole of Bengal from India and merge it with Pakistan.
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শ্যামাপ্রসাদ না থাকলে পশ্চিমবঙ্গ পাকিস্তানে চলে যেত: তারকেশ্বরে মোদী#PaschimbangaDiwas #NarendraModi #ShyamaPrasadMukherjee #Tarakeswar pic.twitter.com/LUi2GILDt5
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— Dainik Statesman (@StatesmanDainik) June 20, 2026
Addressing the first official Paschimbanga Diwas celebration at Tarakeshwar in Hooghly district after the change in government in West Bengal, Modi claimed that during the period leading up to Independence, there had been attempts by political forces to separate Bengal from India and that even Congress had eventually accepted those plans.
He said Syama Prasad Mookerjee emerged as the key figure who resisted such efforts and launched a movement for a separate homeland for Bengali Hindus within India.
“The youth should know this. When there was a plan to annex Bengal to Pakistan, Congress was giving in to their plan. Then Syama Prasad Mukherjee stood against it and he made a resolution and so the Bengali Hindu Homeland movement started,” Modi said.
পশ্চিমবঙ্গ দিবসের মঞ্চে বঙ্গবাসীর প্রতি শ্রদ্ধা জানিয়ে বার্তা মোদীর#DainikStatesman #NarendraModi #PaschimBangaDivas #PMKisan #WestBengal #Politics pic.twitter.com/T0F3q4yrcj
— Dainik Statesman (@StatesmanDainik) June 20, 2026
The Prime Minister said several prominent personalities like Meghnad Saha, R.C. Majumdar and Suniti Kumar Chattopadhyay and industrialists like G D Birla joined the movement initiated by Mookerjee.
According to Modi, the movement eventually forced those favouring the inclusion of the whole of Bengal in Pakistan to reconsider their position.
“This mass movement forced anti-Indian people to think that the entire Bengal cannot be cut off from the country,” he said.
Tracing the historical significance of the date, Modi referred to June 20, 1947, when Bengal’s Legislative Assembly voted in favour of partitioning undivided Bengal, leading to the creation of West Bengal within the Indian Union while eastern Bengal became part of Pakistan.
Political supporters of the observance argue that the decision preserved a section of Bengal within India at a time marked by communal unrest and uncertainty.
BJP leaders maintain that Mookerjee played a central role in shaping the political movement that led to the creation of West Bengal.
“So by keeping a portion of Bengal in India was not protecting a culture but keeping it alive even today. Paschimbanga Diwas is not a date; it is remembering history. We salute the sacrifice and the culture of Bengal,” Modi said.
Referring to Bengal’s experience during the years preceding Independence, the Prime Minister recalled the communal violence that engulfed the region.
“During Independence, Bengal sacrificed the most. In 1946, the Great Calcutta Killing and the communal riots of Noakhali took place. Bengalis gave their lives. Bengal saw the division of their motherland but Bengal did not sacrifice its pride,” he said.
Modi alleged that the historical role of Syama Prasad Mookerjee and the movement behind the formation of West Bengal had not been adequately highlighted by successive governments.
“When this should have been propagated among people, that was suppressed. There was an effort to suppress all those ideas,” he said.
In an attack against the previous governments in the state, Modi alleged that Congress, the Left and later the Trinamool Congress had pushed Bengal backwards.
“First Congress, then Left and then TMC made this place a haven for infiltrators. When Bengal should have spearheaded the development of the country, it moved backward,” he said.
Modi also linked the historical narrative with present-day development initiatives and said the current administration had started addressing the problems inherited from earlier governments.
“The hole that was made by Communist and Trinamool Congress governments — the double-engine government has started working at lightning speed,” he said.
“This date is more important because the dream of the great soul of Bengal, Syama Prasad Mukherjee, to see a developed Bengal, should be fulfilled. I can see change in the eyes of the people,” he said.
The decision to celebrate June 20 as Paschimbanga Diwas has remained politically contentious in West Bengal.
While the BJP and its allied organisations argue that the date commemorates the preservation of Bengal within India, opposition parties, particularly the Trinamool Congress, have opposed the observance and raised objections to the interpretation of history surrounding the event.
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