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Avoid Musilm-dominated places, Bengal BJP leader tells tourists, citing Pahalgam
The remarks triggered sharp reactions from the TMC, which said that the BJP leader was speaking like terrorists who attacked Pahalgam
Kolkata: Suvendu Adhikari, leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the West Bengal legislative assembly, on Friday said tourists should avoid Muslim-dominated places like Kashmir, citing the Pahalgam terror attack, a day after Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah invited his Bengal counterpart Mamata Banerjee to his home state and she accepted it.
“Don’t go to places where there are Muslim-habitats. If you want to go to Jammu and Kashmir, go to Jammu. Avoid Muslim-dominated destinations. (In Pahalgam) Tourists were identified on the basis of their religion and murdered. I am telling the Bengalis. Don’t go to places where Muslims are in majority. Your life is your first priority. Save your life,” Adhikari told reporters.
On Thursday, Omar Abdulla met Mamata Banerjee at the state secretariat in Kolkata and invited her to his state and Banerjee said that she would try to visit Jammu and Kashmir after the (Durga) puja.
Tourism in Jammu and Kashmir had taken a hit after terrorists opened fire and killed 26 people, mostly tourists, in Pahalgam town of Jammu and Kashmir on April 22.
Abdullah on Thursday said that tourism in the Union Territory was bouncing back.
Adhikari said, “Go to Himachal Pradesh. There is Devbhoomi. Visit Uttarakhand and Odisha. People should visit every place in India.”
His remarks triggered sharp reactions from the Trinamool Congress (TMC), which said that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) legislator was speaking like terrorists who attacked Pahalgam.
In a statement, the TMC described Adhikari’s remarks as a “disgraceful, calculated, act of communal provocation.”
“The LoP is speaking like a terrorist. The terrorists wanted to cripple the tourism industry in Jammu and Kashmir which forms the UT’s backbone. The LoP is speaking in the same lines. We were shocked to hear this statement of the BJP legislator,” Shashi Panja, state women and child development minister, told the media on Friday.
The TMC in a social media post also raised questions whether the Prime Minister, Union home minister and the external affairs minister endorse his remarks.
After the Pahalgam attack, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said that the intent was to incite riots in India and to disrupt the livelihood of the hardworking people of Kashmir.
“By discouraging the people of Bengal from visiting Jammu & Kashmir and warning them against travelling to certain tourist areas, @SuvenduWB has shamelessly echoed the terrorists’ agenda. This is exactly the fear they wanted to spread and Suvendu handed them that victory. Do @narendramodi, @AmitShah and @DrSJaishankar endorse such UNDEMOCRATIC, UNCONSTITUTIONAL, ANTI-FEDERAL, and DIVISIVE remarks?” the TMC wrote on X.
This comes days after Samik Bhattacharya, the new president of the BJP’s West Bengal unit, urged the “open-minded, progressive, nationalist Muslims” to join hands in the state, where assembly elections are due in 2026.
