Guwahati, July 19: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and her Assam counterpart Himanta Biswa Sarma traded sharp accusations on social media on Saturday, with Banerjee alleging that the BJP-led Assam government was “threatening” Bengali-speaking people, and Sarma accusing her of indulging in politics of “appeasement” to secure votes.

Banerjee took to X to state that Bengali is the country’s second most spoken language and the second most spoken in Assam, and that targeting citizens for upholding their mother tongue was “discriminatory and unconstitutional”. She warned that the BJP’s “divisive agenda” in Assam had “crossed all limits” and declared her support for every “fearless citizen” fighting for the dignity of their language and identity.

Within minutes, Sarma fired back on X, asserting that Assam was “not fighting our own people” but “fearlessly resisting the ongoing, unchecked Muslim infiltration from across the border,” which he claimed had led to an “alarming demographic shift” and placed Hindus “on the verge of becoming a minority” in several districts. He maintained that the state did not divide people by language or religion, and contended that Banerjee’s stance amounted to “compromising Bengal’s future” by encouraging illegal encroachment and appeasing a particular community for vote banks.

Sarma further cited the Supreme Court’s characterization of large-scale infiltration as “external aggression,” and urged Banerjee to focus on preserving Assam’s cultural foundation rather than politicising the issue. He vowed that Assam would “continue to fight to preserve its heritage, its dignity, and its people—with courage and constitutional clarity”.

Banerjee, who led a protest march in Kolkata on Wednesday against the alleged harassment of Bengali-speaking migrants in BJP-ruled states, has consistently accused those governments of branding Bengalis as “illegal Bangladeshis” or “Rohingyas” to stoke communal divisions.