The swearingin of West Bengal’s first B J P government on Rabindra Jayanti is not merely symbolic politics. It is a civilisational correction. For far too long, Bengal – the cradle of India’s intellectual and spiritual renaissance – was governed by regimes that seemed deeply disconnected from the very ethos that once made the state a cultural torch bearer. The significance of a BJP government taking oath on the birth anniversary of Rabindranath Tagore lies precisely in this: Bengal is attempting to rediscover its soul.
Bengal is the land of Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, who challenged social evils through enlightened reforms. It is the land of Ramakrishna Paramahamsa and Swami Vivekananda, who infused India with spiritual confidence and national awakening. The land of Tagore, whose poetry elevated freedom from a political aspiration to a civilisational ideal. Yet under Mamata Banerjee, Bengal increasingly resembled a state inspired less by its sages and reformers and more by the politics of Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy – where intimidation, communal appeasement and suppression of political opponents became normalised instruments of governance.
The post-poll violence of 2021 remains one of independent India’s darkest democratic stains. BJP workers were hunted, homes torched, women assaulted and entire villages terrorised because citizens dared to vote against the ruling party. Bengal ceased to be a democracy governed by law and increasingly became a territory controlled through fear. The TMC ecosystem did not merely tolerate criminality, it politically weaponised it. Nothing exposed this degeneration more brutally than Sheikh Shahjahan and the horrors of Sandeshkhali. The allegations of systematic intimidation and exploitation emerging from Sandeshkhali shook the nation. Yet for months, the ruling establishment appeared more invested in protecting political interests than ensuring justice for vulnerable women.
Similarly, the tragedy surrounding RG Kar Medical College and Hospital became not merely a law-and-order failure but a moral indictment of the state government. The courage and dignity displayed by Ratna Debnath stood in stark contrast to the evasiveness and political defensiveness of the ruling dispensation. While grieving parents sought justice, the state machinery appeared preoccupied with damage control. This is the essential difference in political character that Bengal voters have now recognised. The BJP’s politics in Bengal is fundamentally anchored in restoring dignity to ordinary citizens, ensuring equal protection under law and reconnecting governance with civilisational values. The ideological battle in Bengal was never simply electoral, it was moral and cultural.
Under the TMC government, corruption became an inextricable institutional culture. Coal scam money allegedly financed sophisticated propaganda operations and political consultancy ecosystems. “Cut money” became a parallel extortion economy imposed upon the poor. Violence became a recognised electoral management tool. Illegal migration was cynically weaponised to alter voting patterns and sustain vote-bank politics. Governance was reduced to patronage, intimidation and perception management. The consequences were devastating not merely politically, but economically and psychologically.
Perhaps the greatest tragedy of modern Bengal has been the outward migration of its brightest minds. For decades, talented Bengali youth – engineers, doctors, entrepreneurs, academics and professionals – were forced to leave their homeland in search of dignity, opportunities, and economic mobility elsewhere. Bengaluru, Pune, Hyderabad, Delhi and Mumbai benefited from Bengal’s intellectual capital while Bengal itself stagnated under political misrule.
A civilisation that once produced India’s sharpest thinkers became synonymous with industrial decline, collapsing institutions and shrinking aspirations. The new BJP government inherits an enormous responsibility: to reverse this historic decline and script Bengal’s cultural, economic and administrative renaissance simultaneously. Its challenge is not merely to improve governance indicators, but to fundamentally alter Bengal’s direction. To rebuild investor confidence. To depoliticise institutions. To dismantle syndicate culture. To restore rule of law. To create industries and opportunities that allow Bengal’s youth to dream within Bengal again instead of fleeing it.
PM Narendra Modi and HM Amit Shah understand something that India’s pseudo-secular establishment never did: economic resurgence without cultural confidence is incomplete. Bengal’s renaissance historically emerged from the fusion of intellectual brilliance, spiritual rootedness and national purpose. The state must rediscover that synthesis. That is why the symbolism of taking oath on Rabindra Jayanti matters profoundly. It marks the beginning of an attempt to move Bengal away from fear, political violence and cynical appeasement towards self-confidence, enterprise and civilisational pride. The task ahead is undeniably challenging. Decades of decay cannot be reversed overnight. But history occasionally offers societies a moment of moral reset.
Bengal may well be standing at such a moment today. The success of this government will ultimately depend on whether it can create the Bengal that Tagore envisioned – a Bengal where political freedom is matched by social courage, economic opportunity and cultural confidence. A Bengal where women feel secure, institutions function impartially, enterprise flourishes and citizens no longer fear political retribution for exercising democratic choice. Above all, a Bengal where the mind is truly without fear.
As Rabindranath Tagore wrote: “Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high; Where knowledge is free; Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls…” The swearing-in on Rabindra Jayanti is significant because it is not just the formation of a new government. It is Bengal’s attempt to reclaim its civilisation, its confidence and its destiny.
(The writer is a national spokesperson of BJP and an acclaimed author.)