Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on Thursday said that he would repost a video showing him symbolically firing at two Muslim men, this time labelling them as “Bangladeshis”.

The video was posted by the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Assam unit on February 7. It combined what appeared to be original footage of the BJP leader handling rifles with artificial intelligence-generated images portraying Muslims as targets.

On-screen text included slogans such as “Foreigner free Assam”, “No mercy”, “Why did you not go to Pakistan?” and “There is no forgiveness to Bangladeshis”.

The clip was deleted following social media criticism.

The Congress’ Assam unit and the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen had filed complaints with the police against Sarma and the BJP for sharing the video. The Communist Party of India (Marxist) and the Communist Party of India also moved the Supreme Court.

Speaking to Aaj Tak on Thursday, the Assam chief minister said that the video was “correct”, but it should have identified the men as “Bangladeshi”.

When told that he could not shoot Bangladeshi citizens or undocumented migrants either, Sarma said that it was only “symbolic” shooting.

“So that Bangladeshis don’t infiltrate into Assam, the Assam chief minister will have to shoot at them, symbolically,” said the BJP leader.

He added the video was deleted as it did not use the word “Bangladeshi”, so it was “legally and constitutionally wrong”.

“However, we will correct it and post it again,” claimed Sarma.

He added that the updated video would not be posted from the BJP’s account but from his personal account.

The statements came in the run-up to the Assembly elections in Assam, which are expected to be held in April.

The BJP’s Assam unit chief Dilip Saikia had earlier claimed that the video was deleted as it was “unauthorised” and “immature”, The Indian Express had reported on February 12.

One of the four co-convenors of the Assam BJP’s social media cell was also removed from his position in connection with the video.

Saikia had told The Indian Express that the party was concerned about “illegal immigrant Bangladeshis in Assam”, adding that there had to be a movement in the society against this.

“But the party does not support the idea of a mala fide intent of targeting Muslims with bullets,”

On February 11, Sarma told reporters that he and the BJP do not support anything that goes against Assamese Muslims.

“We are not against Assamese Muslims but against Bangladeshi Muslims, Miya Muslims,” he said. “That photograph [in the video] should have made the difference [clear] between Bangladeshi and Indian Muslims.”

In Assam, “Miya” is a derogatory word used to refer to undocumented immigrants and is exclusively directed at Muslims of Bengali origin. They are often accused of being undocumented migrants from Bangladesh.

Once a pejorative in Assam, from the common use of the honorific “Miya” among South Asian Muslims, the term has now been reappropriated by the community as a self-descriptor to refer to Muslims who migrated to Assam from Bengal during the colonial era.

In the past month, Sarma has made a series of remarks targeting Miyas, including claiming that it was his job to “make them suffer”, and saying that he had directed BJP workers to file applications seeking to strike the names of Miya Muslims off the electoral rolls.

However, in February, the Supreme Court had declined to entertain petitions seeking that a first information report be filed against Sarma for hate speech against Muslims.

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