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Tag: Shantanu Thakur

  • Union minister Shantanu Thakur quits Bengal BJP’s WhatsApp groups

    By PTI

    KOLKATA: In a major embarrassment to BJP, Union Minister of State for Ports, Shipping and Waterways Shantanu Thakur, and a leader of the politically powerful Matua community has quit all WhatsApp groups of the party’s state unit.

    Thakur, the union minister of state for shipping Tuesday told reporters “It seems the state BJP leadership does not think we (Matuas) have an important role within the organization.”

    He also wondered if he was of any importance to the BJP state unit any more.

    Thakur, who refused to say anything else, did not take phone calls by PTI.

    His stance along with the move by 5 BJP MLAs earlier last month to quit party WhatsApp groups places a question mark over their future course of action, said analysts.

    The 40-year-old politician is the Sanghadhipati, All India Matua Mahasangha, an influential Matua community body.

    The Matuas who form one of the largest groups in the state’s border districts of North and South 24 Parganas, Nadia and elsewhere have in recent times been split in their voting intentions between the BJP and the TMC.

    The scheduled caste community has considerable clout in at least four Lok Sabha seats and 30-40 assembly seats and has sizable following in neighboring Bangladesh too.

    The Bongaon MP had a few days back voiced his reservation against omission of some MLAs of the Matua community in the reconstituted BJP state and district committees.

    He had, however, said he remained loyal to the party.

    Reacting to the development, BJP state president Sukanta Majumdar said “We will sort out any misunderstanding with Shantanu Thakur.

    He is very much a part of the BJP family.

    ” When asked to comment, Trinamool Congress Rajya Sabha MP Sukhendu Sekhar Roy told reporters that the BJP had used Matua community for its own electoral gains.

    “But it (BJP) was not concerned about their real development.

    It is clear now,” he added.

    Over a week ago five BJP MLAs – Mukutmoni Adhikari, Subrata Thakur, Ambica Roy, Asok Kirtania and Asim Sarkar had expressed their displeasure over their omission from the state party committee and left the WhatsApp group of MLAs of the saffron party.

    Adhikari had said that the aspirations of the people of his constituency may not be fulfilled by the newly formed BJP state committee.

    Ambica Roy had, however, expressed his wish to rejoin the BJP WhatsApp group on December 27, two days after quitting it and said he would sort out any difference with the party.

    The community was wooed by the ruling TMC in the state and BJP alike before the state election and Prime Minister Narendra Modi had even visited Orakandi, the ancestral village of the sect’s founder Harichand Thakur during his March 2021 visit to Bangladesh.

  • Union minister Shantanu Thakur claims arrest during BJP rally, Bengal cops say himself boarded van

    By PTI

    KOLKATA: Union Minister Shantanu Thakur on Tuesday claimed that he was arrested at Birati in North 24 Parganas district even as the police said that he himself boarded a police vehicle.

    BJP workers had assembled at Birati as part of the party’s “Shahid Samman Yatra” in West Bengal.

    Thakur, who is a member of the Lok Sabha from Bongaon constituency in North 24 Parganas, claimed that he was arrested by the police when he went to a temple there to offer puja.

    A police official said that while BJP workers were arrested for illegally assembling there, Thakur had boarded the police vehicle on his own.

    Thakur and other BJP leaders, including Jay Prakash Majumdar and Archana Majumdar, along with party workers and supporters were taken to the Airport police station.

    “I came to offer puja and was arrested by the police,” the Union Minister of State for Ports, Shipping and Waterways told reporters.

    On the claim of the police that he was not apprehended and that he himself boarded the police vehicle, Thakur said, “If I had got arrested on my own, why will so many others be there with me here.”

    Thakur alleged that the police told him that he was doing “illegal work” by being at that place.

    “I believe that democracy and ‘adhyatma bad’ (spiritualism) has been finished in West Bengal,” he said.

  • Union Cabinet reshuffle: Strategy evident in selection of four ministers from West Bengal

    Express News Service
    KOLKATA:  The Centre’s decision of axing two Ministers for State from West Bengal and drafting fresh four Bengal BJP MPs in the Union Cabinet appears to be well-designed, with an eye on balancing the caste and regional equations in the state.

    BJP did not do well in the recent Assembly polls. But around half of the 77 seats they won came from north Bengal and SC-dominated regions. The four new ministers represent various communities and ethnic groups. Two of them are from north Bengal. Cooch Behar MP Nisith Pramanik (Home Affairs and Sports) represents Rajbongshis, the largest faction of the state’s SC community. Alipurduar MP John Barla (Minority Affairs) is the tribal face of the tea garden region.

    Bongaon MP Shantanu Thakur (Port, Shipping, Waterways) belongs to the Matua community, which is a Hindu religious sect of SC refugees from Bangladesh. Bankura MP Subhas Sarkar (Education) was the other one chosen. He is known to have done well for BJP in the Jungle Mahal belt.

    ‘‘Rajbongshis form around 40% of the electorates in north Bengal and the community has a stake of nearly 20% in the Jalpaiguri and Alipurduar regions. Selection of two MPs from this region clearly indicates that the party doesn’t want to lose its Rajbongshi and tribal vote share achieved since the 2019 Lok Sabha elections,’’ said a BJP leader in Kolkata.

    North Bengal has proven to be the saffron camp’s stronghold in the last two elections. The region has 54 Assembly seats, of which BJP won 30. In the remaining 240, BJP secured victory only in 37.

    Barla recently raised a demand that north Bengal should become a separate Union Territory. Although the party did not officially endorse his view, naming him in the Cabinet suggests he remains an important figure in the scheme of things. “Separate statehood has been a long-standing demand of Gorkhas in the hills and Rajbongshis in the foothills. The inclusion of Barla in the Cabinet sends a message that the Centre is not ignoring local sentiments,” said the leader.

    Thakur had on several occasions expressed discontent over the issue of non-implementation of CAA, a promise BJP had made before the 2019 Lok Sabha polls to grant Matua refugees citizenship. “BJP performed well in Matua strongholds. Since implementation of CAA seems impossible now, Thakur was rewarded to ease out the discontent of Matuas, who will be needed in 2024 LS polls,’’ said another leader.

  • Santanu Thakur: An influential Matua community leader from Bengal

    By PTI
    KOLKATA: It was a family feud that brought Shantanu Thakur into politics and now he is one of the most influential leaders of the politically-crucial Matua community of West Bengal.

    Thirty-eight-year-old Shantanu Thakur, Lok Sabha member from Bongoan parliamentary seat who was sworn in as a union minister this evening, is one of the heir apparents of the influential Thakurbari a socio-religious sect formed by his ancestors Harichand-Guruchand Thakur- for the uplift of the Matuas, the second-largest scheduled caste community of the state.

    A graduate by education, Shantanu Thakur, the eldest son of former TMC minister Manjul Krishna Thakur, was more into the development of the Matuas through various social services run by the Thakurbari in Thakurnagar and was never into politics.

    Matuas, with their sheer size of the population and tendency to vote en bloc, just like the minorities, make for an enviable vote bank that all the political parties had tried to secure since the nineties.

    TMC chief Mamata Banerjee had first reached out to the Matuas around a decade ago.

    She nominated Manjul Thakur as a candidate in 2011 and inducted him in her ministry as a minister of state.

    In 2014, Manjul’s elder brother Kapil Krishna Thakur was nominated as a TMC candidate from the Bongaon Lok Sabha seat, which he had won hands down.

    But it was the sudden death of Kapil Krishna in October 2014 that kick-started the family feud between his widow Mamata Bala Thakur and his brother-in-law Manjul Krishna.

    Manjul wanted his youngest son Subrata Thakur to be nominated by the party for the by-election from the Bongaon seat, but the party leadership instead decided to nominate Mamata Bala.

    An infuriated Manjul Krishna quit the state cabinet to join the BJP and got Subrata, a party ticket to contest from the seat in February 2015, but he came third.

    Although Manjul Krishna returned to the TMC after few months but was never inducted back into the ministry; the party affairs in the area were handed over to Mamata Bala, the newly elected TMC MP Bongoan.

    But after his father was denied a ticket in the 2016 assembly polls and was cornered in the internal politics over the control of Thakurbari, Shantanu started hobnobbing with the saffron party.

    It was in February 2019, following a socio-religious meeting of the Matua community, which Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed, that Sanatanu decided to join active politics, and within a month, he was given nomination from the Bongaon Lok Sabha seat.

    Ridding on the promise of implementation of CAA and NRC, Shantanu won the seat by defeating his aunt and became one of the key leaders of the BJP in the state.

    He had also accompanied Modi to Bangladesh during his last visit to Dhaka in the middle of the Bengal assembly polls, which also included a tour to Orakandi in Gopalgank district in Bangladesh where the founder of the Matua sect and social reformer Harichand Thakur was born.

    Voting patterns in the recently-held assembly elections showed that the Matuas did not vote en-bloc for any one party and preferred to split their vote between the ruling TMC and the BJP.

    His induction in the union ministry is seen as an attempt to woo back the community, which exhorts influence in at least five Lok Sabha seats in Nadia, North and South 24 Parganas districts, ahead of the 2024 general elections.

  • Amit Shah likely to address Matuas to quell discontent ahead of West Bengal polls

    Express News Service
    KOLKATA: Union Home minister Amit Shah is likely to visit Thakurbari, the headquarters of the religious organisation of the Matuas at Bongaon in North 24 Parganas, to address the community comprising Hindu refugees from Bangladesh on the implementation of the contentious Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).

    The Matuas have been insisting that Shah visit their headquarters and let them know by when their demands for citizenship can be met.

    Shantanu Thakur, the MP from Bongaon representing the Matuas, said the community is confused about when the CAA will be implemented and they will gain citizenship – a promise that the BJP had made before 2019 Lok Sabha elections and which had secured them the votebank of the Matuas.

    The confusion among the community was exacerbated after both Shah and BJP’s national president JP Nadda, during their Bengal visit, dodged questions related to the party’s citizenship promise for Hindu migrants from Bangladesh. Both the national leaders said the process of CAA’s implementation was getting delayed because of Covid-19 pandemic.

    Thakur, on several occasions in the recent past, expressed his discontent saying if his party doesn’t keep its promise before the upcoming Assembly elections, no one can say what the Matuas’ political alignment in the upcoming election will be. To pacify Thakur, senior BJP functionaries in Bengal had held a meeting with him.

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    “Matuas are waiting to hear from Shah as he played the key role to get the contentious act passed in both the houses of Parliament,” said Thakur.

    The BJP’s national leadership decided to send Shah to Bongaon as Matuas and Dalits, who also migrated from Bangladesh and do not belong to the community, have a strong presence in some of the pockets of the state and can change the political landscape in at least 55 Assembly seats.      

    In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the Matua community voted en bloc for BJP candidates. Thakur bagged his win with a margin of more than one lakh and Ranaghat MP Jagannath Sarkar won with a margin of more than two lakh votes. 

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    Eyeing the votebank, Trinamool Congress chief and Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee addressed a rally in Bongaon and announced a slew of benefits and projects for the Matuas.