Reiterating her accusation that the Bharatiya Janata Party has unleashed “linguistic terrorism” against Bengali speakers, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Sunday alleged that a Bengali migrant worker’s family was harassed and tortured by the police in Delhi.

The chief minister shared a video on social media in which a man can be heard accusing the Delhi Police of beating his wife and infant son.

“Atrocious!! Terrible!! See how Delhi Police brutally beat up a kid and his mother, members of a migrant family from Malda’s Chanchal,” Banerjee wrote. “Even a child is not spared from the cruelty of violence in the regime of linguistic terror unleashed by the BJP in the country against the Bengalis!”

It is unclear when the purported video was recorded.

Banerjee’s statement came on the day that the Trinamool Congress launched the “Bhasha Andolan”, a campaign against the alleged harassment of Bengali-speaking persons in BJP-ruled states.

The Trinamool Congress chief had announced the protest on July 21 at the party’s annual Martyrs’ Day rally in Kolkata, saying that the fight to protect the Bengali language and identity would continue until the BJP was voted out.

Assembly elections in West Bengal are expected to take place in March or April 2026.

Her remarks also come amid Indian authorities pursuing a policy over the past month to “push” individuals claimed to be undocumented migrants into Bangladesh. Many of those forced out of the country claim that they are Indian citizens.

Reports of migrant workers from West Bengal living in BJP-ruled states, including Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh and Delhi, being detained and deported under allegations that they were Bangladeshi citizens have also emerged.

India has forced more than 2,000 persons, alleged to be undocumented migrants, into Bangladesh since the country launched “Operation Sindoor”, a military operation against terrorist camps in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.

The legality of the “push back” policy has been debated in India and internationally. Experts have told Scroll that the policy violated India’s obligations under international law and customary international law.

In June, four men from West Bengal, who had been picked up by the Maharashtra Police and forced into Bangladesh, were brought back on June 15. The Murshidabad Police in West Bengal had presented proof of them being Indian citizens.

On July 16, the Calcutta High Court asked the Union government if there was truth to the claims that Bengali-speaking persons were being deported to Bangladesh.

Also read: ‘Hindus will suffer more’: BJP’s ‘Bangladeshi’ politics could alienate its refugee vote in Bengal