‘Communal compromise?’: CPI-M’s Bengal chief meets controversial Babri Masjid replica builder
New Delhi: The Communist Party of India (Marxist) state unit’s topmost leader’s early Thursday outreach towards West Bengal’s controversial Babri Masjid replica builder stands out against Communists presenting themselves as secular and anti‑communal politicians.
Left leaders have largely presented themselves as secular and anti‑communal, while Janata Unnayan Party Chief Humayun Kabir is associated with the Babri‑style mosque initiative in West Bengal’s Murshidabad district.
Kabir, a former senior police officer, has openly proclaimed himself a leader of Muslims, and sought support of parties like the Asaduddin Owaisi-led AIMIM, and the Indian Secular Front (ISF) of Pirzada Naushad Siddiqui.
Meanwhile the CPI(M), facing political marginalisation, with no representation in the 294-member West Bengal Assembly, appears ready to extend a hand publicly ahead of another election even to people known for exhibiting religious bias.
Reports quoted Kabir terming Thursday’s meeting “a very positive discussion”, while expressing optimism about a possible alliance with the CPI(M) and other “anti‑Bharatiya Janata Party” (BJP), “anti‑Trinamool Congress” forces, saying he was “90 per cent sure something good will happen”.
But CPI(M)’s West Bengal Committee Secretary Mohammed Salim characterised the meeting as an effort to understand Kabir’s political thinking rather than a formal alliance move.
It is yet to be seen how he further engages with the controversial leader Kabir, and how the party will justify such outreach to its core supporters.
Thursday’s meeting was in ways a “back to the future” moment for the CPI(M) which led the Left Front-Congress bloc to a tactical alliance with the then newly created ISF of Naushad Siddiqui ahead of the 2021 West Bengal Assembly polls.
The alliance ended in a disaster at the hustings with the two established national parties failing to win a single Assembly seat, and the ISF, contesting as the alliance’s Muslim‑focused ally, won a single seat in the minority-dominated constituency of Bhangar.
The ISF was launched shortly before the 2021 West Bengal elections claiming to represent marginalised Muslim communities and other disadvantaged groups.
At that time too, the Congress joined the alliance somewhat reluctantly.
Incidentally, Humayun Kabir’s just-launched political outfit Janata Unnayan Party, too has a slogan similar to that of the ISF.
It was then part of the Left Front and the Congress — both having ruled West Bengal at different times — seeking a broader “anti‑Trinamool, anti-BJP” coalition.
They saw ISF as a way to consolidate sections of the Muslim vote that both Left and Congress had struggled to mobilise on their own since the ascendence of Trinamool Congress Chief Mamata Banerjee in state politics.
The ISF’s limited electoral success and organisational depth meant the alliance did not translate into a sustained shift in West Bengal’s political map; subsequent years saw the ISF reassess its alliances and at times move independently.
This time, the meeting took place when the Left-Congress alliance was poised precariously with terse exchanges between the allies over a possible tie-up for the upcoming polls with the Congress taking its time over CPI(M) leader Salim’s overtures.
State Congress leader Roahan Mitra was quick to react with a Facebook post of disapproval, “Are you so desperate to be an MLA that you have to hold a meeting with a bankrupt politician who talks about throwing Hindu corpses into the Bhagirathi? The issue — an alliance and seat-adjustment. Has the term ‘secularism’ been removed from politics in Bengal?” he wrote.
During the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, Humayun Kabir is said to have made the statement, threatening that if he won he would throw Hindus into the Bhagirathi River.
“This is an example of Leftist-liberalism where survival matters more than ideals,” quipped a former Leftist youth leader, now with the Bharatiya Janata Party.